


What Dreams May Come

by Nyssareen



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Behind the Scenes, Developing Relationship, Dreams, F/M, Season/Series 01, Slow Burn, season 1 rewrite
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-19
Updated: 2019-01-31
Packaged: 2019-07-14 05:41:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 45,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16034135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nyssareen/pseuds/Nyssareen
Summary: When the Doctor first met Rose Tyler and decided to take her with him, he intended to show her all of time and space, thrill her and, most of all, show her how impressive he was. He knew he would change her life. He never considered how impressive this simple shop girl really was or how much she would change his life. (A rewrite/behind-the-scenes story taking place throughout season 1)





	1. The End of the World

**Author's Note:**

> The title is from Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
> 
> Thanks to my lovely beta ScooterThyme and my Britishisms expert dancingonduckstreet.
> 
> The first chapter is Teen, but the rest of the story is definitely Explicit.
> 
> So, without further ado, here is my first attempt at a multi-chapter story posted one chapter at a time. I hope you enjoy it!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor took Rose Tyler away from 21st century London to show her the wonders of the universe... And maybe a few of the horrors while he was at it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've edited this some since the original post. The story is still exactly the same, I just did some cleaning and expanded a few things. Hopefully, it made it better.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

_We live, as we dream–alone_

_Heart of Darkness ~_  Joseph Conrad

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

“Right then, Rose Tyler, you tell me. Where do you wanna go? Forwards or back?”

“Forwards.”

The Doctor watched Rose’s face as the TARDIS wheezed her way forward in time. He didn’t know whether he wanted her to be thrilled or frightened… but he definitely wanted her to be impressed.

“Ten thousand in the future. Step outside, it’s the year 12,005, the New Roman Empire.”

“You think you’re so impressive.”

“I _am_ so impressive!”

 “You wish.”

“Right, then, you asked for it. I know _exactly_ where to go.”

Wheels spun and gears flipped as the Doctor did everything he could to make steering the TARDIS look as impressive as it was. Time Lords were impressive and he had been more impressive than most long before he was the last one left. Rose was hanging onto the console, looking around nervously as the TARDIS shuddered its way into the future and he watched with a dark glee. He would show her he was impressive, even if he had to scare her into it.

*

“This is the day the sun expands. Welcome to the end of the world.”

Rose looked impressed; in fact, she looked horrified. Fantastic. For just a moment, the Doctor wondered if he had the right to do this to her, but he dismissed the thought. He had seen the destruction of his world, he was only showing her some of what he had seen. It wasn’t the same thing, her world would be dying a natural death, not destroyed the way his had, but he knew it would upset her, nevertheless. If was a better man, he would have shied away from being so spiteful, but he wasn’t, and she wasn’t impressed with him the way he needed her to be. If he had to scare her into it, so be it. The universe was scary, so was he, and she _should_ be afraid. This was for her own good. He could almost pretend he believed that.

“Is that what you do? You jump in at the last second and save the Earth?”

“I’m not saving it. Time’s up.”

The crestfallen look on her face shouldn’t give him so much satisfaction and he shouldn’t be so eager to watch her watch her planet burn, but he wanted to see her reaction to the destruction. Most humans would be sentimental and get upset at their home exploding before their eyes, but she had proven that she wasn’t like most humans with the way she had handled the Nestene Consciousness. How far did that difference extend? Whatever happened would be interesting, but he knew what he was hoping for.

*

He breathed out into the treewoman, Jabe’s face.

“How… intimate.”

“There’s more where that came from.”

“I bet there is.”

This flirtation was entirely about Rose, he was using Jabe to gauge Rose’s reaction without a thought for how it might affect the other woman. Rose was jealous, that was very interesting. He filed the information away with the other observations he was making of Rose.

While Cassandra droned on about the Earth, the Doctor watched Rose. Her reactions were fascinating to him. Rose’s distress was obvious to anyone who was watching and despite appearances, the Doctor was watching closely. Music blared and people milled about and, finally, Rose bolted from the room with the Doctor close behind. For the first time, he wondered whether he had been right to throw her into this situation.

*

The guilt the Doctor felt at Rose’s distress in the reception area faded when she got upset at the TARDIS translating for her without asking _permission._ When she asked where he was from, anger flared in its place.

“This is who I am. Right here, right now. All that counts is here and now and this is me!”

Just as he had suspected, she wasn’t looking forward to watching her planet burn, _and_ she was offended by the remarkable abilities of the TARDIS. Bringing another ape onto the TARDIS had been a bad idea, no matter how different Rose seemed. How _impressive_ would she find him if he just left her here?

“Don’t argue with the designated driver… We’re out of range… just a bit…”

Rose’s forlorn tone made the Doctor chastise himself, she had a point and he was wrong to be angry with her. He’d taken her to watch her planet burn with people unlike anything she’d ever seen and acted like it was a gift, then told her that he’d invaded her mind without so much as a by-your-leave. Her being upset should have been a given.

“Tell you what, a little bit of jiggery-pokery…”

Hopeful anticipation filled the Doctor as Rose dialed her mum. With her attention focused on her phone, he was free to study her face. On the surface, Rose Tyler didn’t look any different from any other 21st century Earth girl, but there was definitely something different about her and it fascinated him. Her laughter and smiles, so happy just because she was hearing her mum’s voice, made him smile too. Yes, definitely something different.

“Five billion years later my mum’s dead…”

Once again, she threw his gift back in his face.

“Bundle of laughs, you are.”

The platform shook. This was more like it, something was wrong and now he could show her what the universe was _really_ like. Whatever it was, it was sure to be exciting and dangerous and he could fix it and show her he was just as _impressive_ as he thought he was.

“That’s not supposed to happen…”

*

When they returned to the reception area, it was clear that Rose was the only one who had been upset by the shaking of the platform. Since there didn’t seem to be any immediate danger, the Doctor decided to take another opportunity to explore Rose’s earlier reactions. Jabe presented herself as the perfect means to that end.

“What do you think, Jabe?”

The look on Rose’s face was just what he’d hoped it would be; inferiority and jealousy. Perfect. Even though it was clear Jabe had no idea what he was talking about, the Doctor pretended she was just the expert he needed.

“I could show you if you like. And your… wife?”

Considering Rose for a moment, the Doctor decided to see how she would take this.

“She’s not my wife.”

“Partner?”

“No.”

With each exchange, shock spread further across Rose’s face as she stared up at him. Fantastic! Wondering how much longer she would let this go on before saying something, he continued, grinning.

“Concubine.”

“No.”

“Prostitute?”

Rose stood, gobsmacked, for just a moment before snapping.

“Well, whatever I am, it must be invisible! D’ya mind?”

There is was! If steam had been coming from her ears, Rose’s anger couldn’t have been more obvious and the Doctor couldn’t hide the glee from his face. If she really thought she had any claim to him, he had thoroughly disabused her of that idea.

“I’m all yours.”

Taking Jabe’s arm, he gave Rose a pointed look. While she tried to hide it with sarcastic comments, it was obvious he had riled her, just as he had intended.

*

Smoke and panic.

This was exactly what the Doctor had been hoping for. Rose was trapped, about to be burned to death, and now he could show her how dangerous things were and then _impress_ her by rescuing her. Time for the show to begin.

First, make her think he was annoyed at her for getting trapped.

“Oh, well it would be you.”

“Open the door!”

“Just give us two ticks.”

_Sun filter rising._

That was disappointing. The sun filter had come up so easily he hadn’t had a chance to really scare her.

_Sun filter descending._

That wasn’t supposed to happen. It was up to _him_ to decide how long this got drawn out, how much danger she was put into, not a computer that thought it was clever.

“It’s just what I need. The computer’s getting clever.”

“Open the door!”

“I know!”

This was not in the plan, the plan was to scare her, not to kill her!

The sonic screwdriver sparked in his hand.

_Sun filter rising. Sun filter rising._

The door still wouldn’t open. This really wasn’t how the scenario had played out in his mind.

“The whole thing’s jammed, I can’t open the door. Stay there, don’t move!”

“Where am I gonna go? _Ipswich_?”

The fact that Rose was still giving lip made the Doctor grin. Now, it was time to figure out who was responsible. Rose may be a stupid human girl, but she was _his_ human girl.

_His?_

*

Jabe burned to death and there was nothing the Doctor could do but watch in horror. It was his stupid game that had brought her here, she was dead because he wanted to make Rose jealous. Everyone he ever met died on the altar of his selfishness, why should Jabe be any different?

Mourning her death would have to wait. Mourning always had to wait. Any minute now, the rest of the guests would be burning to death, too. _Rose_ would be burning to death. Anyone here could burn, but not Rose.

_Not Rose._

*

Danger dealt with, the Doctor stalked back into the reception room, anger radiating off of him in waves. After a cursory glance at Rose to make sure she was alright, he walked across the room to Jabe’s family. Before anything else, they had to be told of her death, then it was time to deal with Cassandra. Then it was time to _punish_ Cassandra. Against her will, the stretch of skin reappeared, mocking those who had just died.

“People have died, Cassandra, you murdered them.”

With contemptuous words, she dismissed the lives she had stolen and his blood boiled.

“Watch me smile, and cry, and flutter…”

Realization hit.

“And creak?”

“And what?”

“And creak. You’re creaking.”

A savage glee filled him when what passed for a look of terror crossed the stretched out skin before him and he grinned widely at the thought of what was coming.

“It’s too hot!”

How the gruesome scene to come would affect the others in the room, would affect _Rose_ , never even crossed the Doctor’s mind. Suffering and loss had been his constant companions for so long that he had forgotten how fear and pain could hurt those around it, as well as within it. His every thought was focused on how much Cassandra deserved the horrible fate coming to her.

“ _You_ raised the temperature.”

“Have pity!”

Pity was something he had in short supply since the horrors of the war and he refused to spare any for this creature. His usually bright eyes were darkened with vengeance,  and he watched, eager to see harsh justice served.

“Oh, Doctor!”

Then Rose was beside him, her voice soft and full of the pity he had long since rejected.

“Help her…”

It startled him that this girl could feel pity, could feel compassion for this creature that had tried to kill her, but he didn’t let it show. This was justified. The Doctor knew it had to happen, but he also knew that Rose’s compassion could work its way through the callousness he’d built up like a shield if he let it, so he refused to look at her. His hard voice betrayed no hint of feeling.

“Everything has its time and everything dies.”

With a blood-curdling scream, Cassandra exploded, throwing bloody skin around the room. A chunk of gore hit Rose in the face and she pulled it off, horrified, but the Doctor simply watched, impassively. Sentence carried out, he stalked from the room, leaving Rose to watch him go, silently, disappointment clear on her face.

*Rose looked out at the smoldering remains of her planet, looking as heartbroken as the Doctor had refused to let himself ever feel. She _was_ different from the other humans. Seeing her home burn had upset her, of course it had, that wasn’t the difference in her. The difference was that Rose hadn’t let it stop her from caring about others, even the one who had nearly caused her death. Guilt stabbed at his hearts as he listened to her mourn her dead planet. He really was a bastard.

“Come with me.”

He took her home.

*

The Earth was still alive and the look of awe on Rose’s face as she gazed at it stirred something in the Doctor. Unbidden, the admission came.

“My planet’s gone. It’s dead.”

When she learned who he was, Jabe had pitied him, just as everyone else did, but there was no pity in Rose’s eyes. Rose’s eyes held only sympathy and sorrow for his loss. The compassion in her cinnamon eyes drew more of the pain from his hearts, like poison from a wound.

“It burned, like the Earth. It’s just rocks and dust. Before its time… There was a war, and we lost.”

There was so much more, but he couldn’t tell her, not yet.

“What about your people?”

“They’re all gone. I’m the only survivor. I’m left traveling on my own ‘cause there’s no one else.”

“There’s me…”

There was her. There was Rose Tyler and that thought soothed some of the pain he still held so tightly. He needed to keep her with him, he needed her soothing presence in his life now.

“You’ve seen how dangerous it is. Do you wanna go home?”

It was a simple question but right now, it was the most important question in the universe. If he met her eyes, she would see just how important it really was, so he didn’t meet her eyes. He couldn’t let her know.

“I dunno… I want…”

_Please stay._

“Oh… can you smell chips?”

It wasn’t what he had expected, but it brought a smile to the Doctor’s face, nonetheless. The question could wait, right now, he did smell chips.

“Yeah.”

“I want chips!”

“Me too.”

“All right then, before you get me back in that box, chips it is and you can pay.”

There was the answer to the question: Rose wanted to stay with him. Awestruck, he shook his head.

“No money.”

“What sort of date are you? Alright, tightwad, chips are on me.”

A wide grin split his face and the Doctor looked down at Rose with a warmth he couldn’t name spreading through him. He couldn’t have hidden his delight if he tried.

“We’ve only got five billion years ‘til the shops close.”

The way she stuck her tongue through her teeth when she grinned thrilled him in a way he couldn’t remember feeling before, and the playful look in her eyes made him happier than he had been in a very long time.

As they walked down the street, hand in hand, in search of chips, the casual observer might take the look of awestruck wonder on his face as that of one newly in love, but that would just be the casual observation; a closer inspection would show it to be much more than that. The Doctor had no idea what to call what he was feeling for her, but when she lay her head on his shoulder, he knew that he never wanted her anywhere but at his side.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

Chips acquired, Rose and the Doctor made their way back to the TARDIS. When they got inside, he set his on the edge of the console and she went to the jumpseat, he presumed, to eat. Once they were safely in the vortex, he picked up his rapidly cooling chips and turned to join her, only to find her curled up on the seat with her own chips spilling out beside her relaxed hand. With another lopsided grin that would probably be misconstrued by the casual observer, he set his chips back down to finish cooling in their greasy paper wrapping and knelt in front of her.

“Rose… Rose? Wake up, I'll take you to somewhere more comfortable than here you can sleep.”

Bleary-eyed, she sat and yawned so widely her jaw popped.

“I thought the TARDIS was just this room.”

Chuckling under his breath, he stood and offered his hand.

“No, there are lots of rooms on the TARDIS. I'm sure we can find one with a bed in it for you. Come on, you'll end up with a very stiff neck if you sleep here.”

When she stood and slipped her warm hand into his, he noticed the pattern from the seams of the seat already forming on her check and raised his other hand to run a finger lightly along it.

“Not to mention the strange patterns you’d get on your check from the grating, though some cultures work very hard for that look. The people on Astrugalon keep intricately carved boards bound tightly to either side of their faces from their 5th birthday until they turn 15 to get the patterns to set. Mind you, they can’t hear a thing until they get the boards removed, but they figure it’s worth it, so who are we to judge?”

Looking up at him as if he'd said… well, just what he had, Rose asked the obvious question.

“Why don't they just get tattoos?”

“They are deathly afraid of needles. The entire civilization died out a thousand years ago because they refused to get their jabs.”

It wasn't the last time Rose Tyler would wonder if the Doctor was making things up, but it was the first and that thought made him laugh just as much as the incredulous look on her face.

When they came to a door that was a virulent shade of pink, the Doctor stopped.

“This must be you.”

Rose's attempted look of confusion was interrupted by another yawn which she valiantly tried to speak though.

“Don't… don't you… know…?”

Wondering if he'd ever stop grinning around Rose, the Doctor shook his head and ushered her into the pink-doored room.

“Nope, I didn't know what room the TARDIS made up for you until she showed me just now. In you go.”

Without any further objection, Rose walked into the room and headed for the bed. The Doctor noticed that, unlike what anyone else had been given upon first joining him, Rose's bed was pink and littered with comfortable looking pillows. Making a mental note to question his oddly behaving ship about that later, he gestured to an armoire situated near the bed.

“There should be something more comfortable to sleep in in that”

But the information fell on deaf ears as Rose was already curled up under the pink flowered duvet, fast asleep. The Doctor frowned slightly, in thought, as he studied her still, sleeping form. She was beautiful and young… _very_ young, and knew very little of her own world, never mind the rest of the universe. It had always thrilled him to see the universe for the first time through the eyes of those he brought with him; that was partly why they tended to be so young, the other part being that those with more experience generally had enough experience to know to keep away from people like him. After considering her for a few moments more, the Doctor closed the door and walked down the hall toward his room, completely forgetting the two sets of chips that were currently littering the floor of the console room.

The TARDIS would take care of them, just as she had taken care of preparing Rose’s room for her and the clothes Rose would love that were currently in her armoire… just as she had taken care of bringing Rose to him in the first place. And just as he hadn’t noticed any of that, he didn’t notice that she had moved his room closer to Rose’s. _Maybe he’ll notice eventually_ , the TARDIS thought vaguely to herself, but she doubted it, he never noticed what was good for him even when she shoved it right under his nose. _Maybe if I shove it into his_ head _this time he’ll notice…_ the TARDIS got an idea that she was sure the Doctor would be angry about. For the first time, she was very glad that he never noticed anything she did for him.

*

Though he fiddled with the various pieces of machinery _(junk)_ in front of him, the Doctor didn’t see any of it, he was too focused on the memories of the day playing over in his mind. At times he smiled to himself, but mostly, he chastised himself for being so cruel to such a sweet, undeserving girl and tried to work out why he had done it. Originally, he told himself his motives were pure, he was going to show her something amazing, but watching one’s home burn was not something any sane person would enjoy and he knew that better than anyone. The point had been to scare her, he admitted that to himself now, but what confused him was why. To show her how dangerous the universe was so she’d be more careful? To scare her into not wanting to come with him? To scare her away from him entirely? Because the war had left him a cruel, heartless bastard who wanted to destroy everything he touched? The final thought was right and he knew it, but he pushed the thought away just as hard as he pushed the junk in front of him away to crash into the wall behind the table.

Scrubbing a hand across his scalp, he stood and paced the room, trying to clear his mind, but couldn’t keep the images from coming. Rose’s face filled with fear, Jabe burning… his home burning. He finally gave up pacing and took his jacket off, threw it over his work chair then slumped down onto the large, beaten-up sofa in the corner. Sprawled out across the worn leather, he suddenly realized he couldn’t remember when he slept last. It had been well before he met Rose and, while he didn’t need as much sleep as a human, he did need to sleep more often than once a month, and he thought it might have been at least that long. With a heavy sigh he stared at the pattern of swirling blues, greens and browns on the ceiling until they became blurry. The shapes reorganized themselves into beautiful, cinnamon brown eyes and he drifted off to sleep.

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

_Warm brown eyes faded into hideous, round ships, tearing the black sky into gaping tatters while the ground below burned violent red and orange._

_Agonized cries were silenced by the sharp ring of blasters, while piercing shrieks demanded the death of everything in their wake._

_His home died a million deaths around him, consumed by flames and blood._

_A figure stalked through the carnage, stepping over the bodies of friend and foe alike, passing through the fire and feeling nothing._

_The figure was not the Doctor._

_Words loomed over him._ No More _carved into a crumbling wall in the jagged lines of a tool intended for death. The words were paramount to everything around him, but the figure passed them without seeing._

_He needed something, but it wasn’t the words._

_A pristine room, warm wood, clean stone, and light. A wall of crystal glass looking out on a world in its death throes. His home died beneath him._

_A girl pressed herself into the far wall, petrified with fear. A human girl. The burning terrified her._ He _terrified her more._

_Her terror thrilled him. Her pale face and the tremors she couldn’t suppress._

_He needed more._

_You asked to come. You asked to stay. You can’t go home now.”_

_The girl tried to press herself further into the unyielding wall, eyes darting, searching for some escape. Beautiful tears filled her eyes when she found her only escape closed off. The door was blackened and burned shut. He had burned it to keep her trapped._

_To keep her where he could enjoy her fear._

_Tremors turned to shaking at his approach and electricity passed through him at the whimpers coming from those beautiful lips._

_It wasn’t enough._

_He lowered himself to the floor in front of her, reveling in the rising panic in her eyes when he grabbed her hand and pulled it to him. His large, rough hand brutally gripped her small, smooth one._

_Her whimpers were music to his ears._

_Tears streamed down pale, beautiful cheeks and she tried to pull her hand from his. She cried out in pain when he tightened his grip until there was a sickening crunch of bones beneath his hand._

_“The TARDIS isn’t the only one that can get into your mind, Rose. I can get in too, if I want.”_

_Her panic rose to fever pitch and she tried to scramble to the side, pleading._

_“I don’t like it in my mind, Doctor, please, you didn’t ask.”_

_Even without invading her mind, he could feel her fear, it rose off her body like the smoke billowing around his dead world._

_“I don’t have to ask, Rose, I can do anything I like. I didn’t tell you what happened to my world._ I _killed it, Rose._ I burned them all _.”_

_He watched the bleeding, scorching world beneath them convulse and the dark sounds of his mirth rang through the quiet space, consuming the sobbing girl before him._

_Her beautiful eyes, so full of sympathy and compassion for everyone she met now filled with cold realization. She finally knew the monster she had let herself be taken in by._

_He still needed more._

_“I’ll make you watch your world burn, too, Rose. Watch it explode before your eyes then leave you here, alone, billions of years from home.”_

_Taking her head in a vice-like grip, he forced her to watch the Earth below explode into dust and rock. The molten core hardened the moment it hit the vacuum and chunks of her beloved home spread through the darkness like viscera from a rotting corpse._

_More. Still more._

_Jabe smiled up at him salaciously and he pulled her tightly to him, letting his hands roam freely over her body before taking her arm. With a final disdainful leer at Rose, he swept from the room._

_She fell to the floor, sobbing and broken. Fear. Pain. Abandonment. He was drunk on them._

_It was finally enough._

_It was too much._

_Jabe screamed and burned before him._

_Far away, Rose screamed. She was burning too._

_Terror gripped him as he ran through burning hallways. Everything exploded and burned around him._

_A blue man in a chair screamed as his flesh sizzled and melted away._

_A tall reptilian couple combusted into sparks and flame._

_The smoke in a giant tank boiled around the giant head encased in it until it exploded into shards that pierced the others in the room, slicing them open as they burned._

_None of them mattered._

_It was his fault, he had wanted this. He had wanted to hurt Rose, to make her suffer as he had suffered._

_He found her just in time to see her burn._

_Golden light enveloped her and she burned with it._

_He burned with it._

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

The Doctor woke with a jerk and a pained yell.

“Rose!”

Sitting bolt upright, he gasped for breath while searching the room, wildly, for the danger. When his mind cleared enough to realize there was none, he lay back and stared up at the ceiling until his breathing returned to normal.

Nightmares were nothing new, he’d had them for a long time. Visions of death and burning were common visitors to his dreams, but this was different. The knowledge that he had hurt Rose hurt him more than he had realized. The carefully constructed, impenetrable walls around his hearts had started to crack.

If this girl didn’t leave his TARDIS, she would destroy him… but she would also save him. He _needed_ her to stay.

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*


	2. The Unquiet Dead

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor intends to take Rose somewhere nice and safe, like Naples, 24th of December, 1860, but gets it a bit wrong on both counts. While Rose doesn't know it, her corset is almost harder for the Doctor to overcome than the Gelth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I went though and made some changes from the original posting. The story is the same, I just reworked some stuff so it made more sense and fleshed some things out.
> 
> Again, thanks to my beta, ScooterThyme and my Britishisms expert, dancingonduckstreet

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

_We all have our time machines,_

_Those that carry us back are memories_

_And those that carry us forward are dreams._  

_The Time Machine ~_ H.G. Wells

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

Rose hadn’t let on, but the Doctor knew that seeing her planet die upset her and he felt bad about putting her through it. The horrible visions from his dream still made him shiver and he promised himself this trip would be different. This time, he would take her someplace nice, beautiful and, most of all, safe.

“I did it! Give the man a medal. Earth, Naples, December 24th, 1860. It’s all yours.”

“But it’s like, think about it, though. Christmas 1860 happened once, just once and then it’s gone, it’s finished, it’ll never happen again. Except for you. No wonder you never stay still.”

She understood. Rose Tyler understood. Of course she did, that was why the Doctor brought her along in the first place. The fear and danger of their previous trip hadn’t upset her for long. She hadn’t wanted to go home, she wanted to carry on and see more. As he smiled down at her, so eager, so excited, so full of hope, he realized what he had seen in her that attracted him in the first place: She was just like him, but how he had been hundreds of years ago. Then, he had been eager to explore all of time and space, to shun the ways of his people in favor of exploring everything he could and saving everyone he could. Rose was bringing him back to himself because she was just like he used to be.

“Not a bad life.”

“Better with two.”

Warmth spread through him at her words. Rose Tyler wanted to see the universe and she wanted to see it with _him_. Their eyes remained locked together, ice blue steady on warm cinnamon, for just a moment before she skipped off down the hall to change. The Doctor grinned, broadly, after her.

While Rose changed, the Doctor worked under the console and thought about what kind of fun they could get up to in Naples. When she came back and he caught sight of her, a sort of fun he hadn’t thought of having in quite a while sprang to mind.

At first, the only thing he saw was the corset. Corsets had always been a favorite of his, and this one was fantastic. The form-fitting crimson velvet was covered with sparkling black illusion lace that shimmered and glittered in the warm light of the console room. The strapless top was cut so low that it was a mere inch or two from being indecent, the only thing keeping it up was the tight boning that pushed her breasts up and nipped her waist in. Rose’s figure was curvaceous to begin with, but this corset emphasized it so enticingly that the Doctor’s hearts raced and his mouth went dry.

The matching skirt was long and full with a ruffle down the side and another around her booted ankles. The Doctor honestly preferred long skirts. Maybe it was because of the fashions back on Gallifrey when he was growing up, or maybe it was the fact that they left so much up to the imagination. The Doctor had a _very_ active imagination which liked to use in all situations, and his imagination was working in overdrive at the moment.

The Doctor’s mouth hung open as he raked his eyes up and down Rose’s body. Blood rushed to his groin and he felt himself begin to stir. That hadn’t happened in a _very_ long time.

“Blimey!”

“Don’t laugh!”

“You look beautiful…”

Rose’s eyes met his and he had an intense desire to take her in his arms, push her against the console and…

Snapping back to his senses, he grasped for a way to cover his awe and excitement as quickly as possible.

“Considering.”

Shifting uncomfortably, he looked away before he could see her face fall.

“Considering what?”

“That you’re human.”

“I think that’s a compliment…”

Her face changed from pleased to confused and the Doctor knew he had upset her, but he had to cover his reaction somehow, and that was the first thing that had come to mind. He hoped Naples on Christmas Eve in 1860 would make up for the snub to her species and herself.

 

*

 

The Doctor watched as Rose took her first step out into the history of her world. The memory of how he had tried to scare her still played over in his mind and he hated himself for it. He was going to make it up to her, though. Now, he was doing what he should have done before: showing her the wonders of the universe without trying to prove he was impressive by risking her life.

“Ready for this? Here we go. History.”

She took his arm, and they both grinned as they set off to see what excitement they could find in Naples’ Christmas of 1860.

Rose’s face as they walked down the street together reminded the Doctor of his own joy at new times and places, so long ago, but he couldn’t keep his eyes from dropping further down her body. Each sway of her hips and each rise and fall of her breasts pulled more blood away from his brain. No matter how many times he told himself it was completely inappropriate, he couldn’t help but stare the beautiful woman beside him. His attention was drawn away from her, however, when he realized that he had missed the landing, as was so frequently the case. Rose said over and over that she didn’t care… except for the fact that they’d had landed in Cardiff, anyway.

Then the screaming started.

The Doctor had thought nothing could excite him more than Rose in a corset, but it was nothing compared to Rose running toward the screaming with him.

 

*

 

Rose ran off to help an old lady, and the Doctor let her go with nothing more than a hasty warning to be careful while he indulged his curiosity. When he ran from the building, expecting to find her, he was just in time to see her being loaded into the back of a hearse that quickly disappeared down the street. Commandeering the nearest carriage, he set off after her. Even the thrill of meeting Charles Dickens couldn’t distract him from rescuing her… well, not for long, anyway.

 

*

 

They were trapped. There was a legion of Gelth-possessed corpses intent on killing them and taking their bodies, and they were trapped. He’d done it again. This time, he hadn’t meant to, but here she was, again, in mortal peril, and it was his fault… again.

“I haven’t even been born yet, it’s impossible for me to die! Isn’t it?”

Rose was terrified. So was the Doctor. He was going to get her killed. He never should have brought her here. After he’d nearly killed her before, he should have taken her straight home and left her there, where she was safe. Taking her away from her home had been wrong in the first place and he knew it.

“I’m sorry, it’s all my fault, I brought you here.”

It had been a long time since the Doctor had actually trembled with fear, but he was doing just that now. It wasn’t the zombies swarming them that scared him, he’d faced much worse than that, it was the thought that he would fail to save Rose, but live on, himself. So soon after the war, that would break him. While he stood, paralyzed by his own fears, Rose reminded him why he’d brought her along. She was prepared to face the danger, head on, and her bracing words pulled him from his stupor.

“We’ll go down fighting. Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Together?”

“Yeah.”

When Rose took his hand, lacing her small, soft fingers through his hard, work worn ones, the Doctor’s fear abated. If he was going to die (in a dungeon… in _Cardiff!_ ), he was going to die with Rose’s hand in his. Somehow, death would be more tolerable with her hand in his. His heart swelled with affection for this ordinary Earth girl who was so extraordinary, and it had nothing to do with her body. Maybe, if he held onto her tightly enough, he wouldn’t be left alone, beside the body of another dead friend.

“I’m so glad I met you.”

Her cinnamon eyes locked on his and his hearts melted at her smile.

“Me, too.”

Her eyes. Her smile. The danger faded from his mind and all he could think of was how much he wanted to fall into those eyes and capture those lips with his own.

“Doctor! Doctor!”

A voice pulled him from her eyes and the Doctor turned, a flash of annoyance crossing his face before he remembered where they were. Charles Dickens’ plan to get them out was a good one, and the Doctor forgave him for pulling their gaze apart… mostly.

 

*

 

Always thinking of others in need before herself, Rose’s first thought was for Gwyneth, even though her own life was in danger. Just like everything else about her, Rose’s compassion endeared her to him. He had to keep her safe. He would do his best to save the others, he always would, but above everything else, Rose Tyler had to be safe.

“I won’t leave her while she’s still in danger. Now go!”

 

*

 

Rose’s eyes bored into his when she realized he’d left Gwyneth behind. The Doctor shifted, uncomfortably, but forced himself to meet her gaze as long as he could.

“I did try, Rose, but Gwyneth was already dead.”

The accusation in those cinnamon eyes made him hang his head in shame. She didn’t understand and he couldn’t bear it if she didn’t know that he had done everything he could to save Gwyneth.

“I think she was dead from the minute she stepped in that arch.”

“She saved the world. A servant girl. No one will ever know.”

As Rose watched the burning remains of the house where a girl had sacrificed herself to save the world, the Doctor studied her face. Her strength was beautiful. Her compassion was beautiful. She was beautiful. He knew he needed her in his life, he’d needed her since before he met her. How he had managed to find her was something he would never understand, but he needed to keep her.

 

*

 

The Doctor was impatient to leave, and he knew it had more to do with getting Rose’s full attention back on himself than having anywhere to go. So, he bade farewell to Charles Dickens, quickly, but Rose kept talking. When the conversation ( _finally_ ) drew to a close, the Doctor clasped Dickens’ hand, warmly, in his own.

“Good luck with it. Nice to meet you, fantastic.”

While Rose wished Dickens farewell, the Doctor turned and opened the TARDIS door, but a soft smacking noise, followed by a startled exclamation from Dickens, caused him to turn back around with a start.

_She kissed him._

Rose kissed _Charles Dickens_.

The Doctor’s gaze swung from Rose to Dickens and back, jealousy painted across his face. Now, he _had_ to get Rose away from Dickens, and quickly, but the man refused to stop talking.

“My books, Doctor, do they last?”

The forlorn tone made the Doctor chide himself for being a fool.

“Oh, yes. Forever.”

But he still needed to get Rose away from Dickens. He didn’t want to take any chances.

“Right. Shed. Come on Rose.”

“But… in the box… both of you?”

The Doctor’s mind raced with what he could do with Rose, alone in his box, and looked down at her. From where he stood, he could see directly down the front of her corset and blood rushed to his groin, again.

“Down boy.”

He tried to convince himself that he was chiding Dickens and not warning himself, but he knew better.

Rose followed the Doctor up the ramp to the console.

“Doesn’t that change history, if he writes about blue ghosts?”

“In a week’s time, it’s 1870, and that’s the year he dies. Sorry.”

“Oh, no. He was so nice.”

Dickens had been dead a hundred years when she was born, but his death still saddened her. A thought occurred to the Doctor that would thrill Dickens and, hopefully, please Rose.

“Let’s give him one last surprise.”

The TARDIS began to dematerialize, and they watched Dickens’ face as startlement turned to awe, and then to joy. The Doctor and Rose laughed with him as the TARDIS faded away from 1869.

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

While the Doctor sent the TARDIS into the vortex, Rose bounced up onto the jumpseat and started swinging her feet above the floor. Now that the danger had passed and they were alone together, he was finding it even more difficult to keep focused on the task at hand and not stare at her. If she didn’t change back into her normal clothes soon, not only was he going to get nothing done, he might just start actually doing things he knew he shouldn’t even be thinking about.

“Why don’t you get changed out of that dress and then I’ll take you to the galley for something to eat?”

The Doctor hazarded a glance at Rose and immediately regretted it. She was leaning forward on her hands, which she had pressed into the seat on either side of her hips. The view was incredible. Either she had no idea what she was doing to him, or she was trying to drive him to distraction, but either way, the tight mental control he’d learned as a Time Lord was straining. If it weren’t for the fact that he’d had no such desires in a long time, he could have managed easily, but going from no sexual thoughts at all to having a beautiful woman, in extremely sexy clothing, completely alone with him was testing him, immensely.

“I’m fine in the dress, Doctor, we can go now.”

Rose jumped down and headed toward the hall, mercifully, turning her back to him so he had a chance to make sure his body hadn’t visibly betrayed him. After following behind her for a few moments, admiring the way her hips swayed and the skirt swished around her ankles, he forced himself to move beside her.

“I really should have shown you the loo when I showed you to your room last night, but suppose you found it on your own.”

Rose looked up at the Doctor, quizzically.

“There is an en suite off my bedroom, Doctor.”

_That's new._

“Really? No one else ever had one before, the TARDIS must really like you.”

Rose fell oddly quiet for a while as they walked down the hall. After a few moments of silence, the Doctor looked down to find her chewing on her thumb with her brow furrowed.

“Penny for ‘em?”

She shook her head and smiled at him.

“Nothing. How many rooms are on the TARDIS, anyway? You only said ‘lots’ before.”

Even though he could tell there was something on her mind, he decided to let it go for the moment and answered her question instead.

“What’s the biggest number you can think of?”

She shrugged.

“Infinity.”

“Exactly.”

They arrived at the galley and he opened the door for her, then bowed her through. The Doctor laughed, loudly, at the stunned look on Rose’s face before gesturing across the room in front of them.

“Welcome to the galley.”

It looked like what one would expect of the serving galley on a large naval ship. Along the wall beside the door was a long counter of chafing dishes, holding various hot foods. Some, the Doctor knew would be recognisable to Rose; steak, porridge, chips, and others would be completely foreign to her; gooey green noodles, large, opaque, red squares and purple sausages in a shockingly pink gravy. Next to that was a set of refrigerated cases with a similar assortment of familiar and unfamiliar cold foods. It was all gleaming glass and highly polished metal with a shining white, tiled floor and not so much as a fingerprint in sight.

“The TARDIS will put out anything you want, just ask. She’s laid out some of her favorites now, she likes to do that when no one’s around. If you want to cook something yourself, she’ll give you what you need, but, I warn you, she gets tetchy when people refuse her cooking and tends to sabotage them. I don’t know why you’d want to cook anything yourself anyway, she’s a fantastic cook.”

He stroked the counter affectionately, and the floor vibrated in what could only be described as a purr. Rose stared down at the floor, obviously confused.

“Doctor… did the TARDIS just… smile?”

“Of course. Now, what shall we have for tea?”

Completely ignoring the startled look on Rose’s face, the Doctor rubbed his hands together and considered the dishes in front of him. After a moment, the porridge morphed into a lemon meringue pie covered with banana slices and a sturdy, white plate with blue cat silhouettes painted around the edges appeared. Rose turned up her nose, but the Doctor ignored her and began to pile his plate with steak, chips and lemon/banana pie.

“Go on, Rose, what would you like?”

“How do I…”

Before she finished her question, golden, battered fish appeared next to the chips, the pudding turned into a very rich looking chocolate cake and a pale yellow plate with wispy wildflowers around the edges appeared before her. Rose stared, wide eyed. The Doctor hadn’t thought about the fact that the TARDIS, helpful thing that she was, would likely anticipate what Rose wanted before she’d voiced it. Hoping the TARDIS’ psychic abilities wouldn’t upset her like they had before, he watched her face, carefully.

“She was just trying to be helpful, that okay?”

Rose nodded slowly, but her brow was furrowed, deeply.

“So, it doesn’t just get in my head and translate, it can read my mind too?”

“To a point, not completely. She really only sees things you need, like what you want to eat or where you need to go.”

He left out that she could be nosey, at times, and needed to be reminded that certain things weren’t her business. People’s dreams, for instance. She probably only did that to him, though. He’d have to make sure she knew to keep out of Rose’s mind, except when absolutely necessary.

Finally, Rose nodded.

“I guess it’s okay, just… try and let me know if there’s anything else she can do before she does it, yeah?”

He nodded as Rose filled her plate, then turned and led her toward the dining area.

“I’ll do my best, but there’s a lot to remember.”

In sharp contrast to the galley, the dining area resembled a country granny’s kitchen. The walls facing the shining counter were painted a cheerful yellow with two windows, hung with chintz curtains in different patterns that went perfectly together. Outside was a sunny blue sky with just a few clouds over green, rolling hills. The appliances under the windows included everything necessary to a kitchen, but looked like what you would find in a doll’s house; the dials were painted on, the sink had no taps and the cabinets had no knobs.

In front of the false kitchen, in the center of a scrubbed wood floor, stood the perfect perfect granny's table, set for tea: atop a worn blue and yellow rag rug stood a white stained table with sturdy, tooled legs, battered by time, but well tended. The table was surrounded by perfectly mismatched chairs and set with crockery, minus the plates in their hands, that was, again, perfectly mismatched, and a blue stoneware pitcher sat on an aged crochet doily in the center.

Against the wall adjacent to the metal galley was an old but well tended oak cabinet displaying a full china set; blue wedgwood plates, teacups and saucers with a matching serving platter, cream pitcher, sugar bowl and teapot. It was just the kind one’s granny would keep in pride of place ‘for best.’

There was no way the scene could be more perfect, and the Doctor knew the TARDIS had made sure of that.

The Doctor took a seat at the table and started in on his banana covered pie without even looking at his steak and chips. It was a moment before he realized Rose hadn’t joined him. She was staring from ‘Granny’s kitchen’ back to the polished galley and back again, a hint of a smile playing on her lips.

“Everything alright?”

Laughing, Rose nodded and finally moved toward the table. The moment her feet touched the scrubbed wood, she stopped and stared at him; He had been waiting for this.

“Is… is that…”

The Doctor grinned as she sniffed the air and a delighted smile crossed her face.

“Is that chocolate chip cookies?”

The Doctor laughed as she skipped to sit beside him at the table.

“The TARDIS likes to go all out when she creates rooms.”

“Well, she does a great job of it, my room is amazing! The loo is bigger than my bedroom back at home and my bedroom is twice as big the lounge. And I’ve never seen a bed that big!”

She picked up a chip and took a bite, then moaned in delight.

“And these chips are gorgeous! I can see why the TARDIS would be insulted by anyone refusing her cooking. She is an amazing cook.”

They ate in silence for a while, except for the pleased noises Rose made from time to time, which the TARDIS definitely appreciated and he rather liked too. As he made his way through his steak and chips, the Doctor watched her. The fact that she had gone from calling the TARDIS ‘it’ to ‘she’ hadn’t escaped his notice and he was happy to see her starting to adjust to the differences between the TARDIS and any old ship. The difference between what Rose and those who had come before her had been given made him curious. Usually, it was a plain white room, often shared, with a single bed, and they’d always had to share the loo in the hall. The TARDIS must sense something special about Rose, too, but didn’t seem to be concerned about it.

As odd as the TARDIS’ behavior toward Rose was, the only thing really concerning the Doctor, just now, was how the way she licked her lips made him want to taste them too. Those pleasured little moans were also deeply concerning, they kept bringing other ways he could get her to moan to mind. The corset was another great concern, as he had to keep forcing himself to remember to eat and not stare at the generous amount of pale, creamy skin on display. Trying to push his completely inappropriate thoughts about Rose from his mind, he reminded himself to get to work on rebuilding his defenses against thoughts like these as soon as possible. If this kept up, he was going to be pushing her against a wall soon… He forced that thought from his mind too.

Finally, Rose pushed her empty plate away and leaned back in her chair lacing her fingers over her stomach and sighed, deeply.

“Blimey, I’m full. Thank you very much, TARDIS, it was wonderful!”

Her compliment was rewarded with a purring smile and she looked back at the Doctor with a grin, tongue poking between her teeth. She really had to stop smiling like that, and the way her almost-bare breasts had risen and fallen with her sigh was practically pornographic. Once again forcing his thoughts to behave, he stood and gestured to the wall behind them.

“Why don’t we go sit down and we can talk about where to go next.”

The Doctor walked over to an overstuffed sofa and footstool in an old fashioned floral pattern that was now sitting against the wall by the door. Rose looked a bit startled to find that furniture had appeared out of nowhere, but not as much as she had been when food appeared. It seemed to be getting easier for her.

“Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it.”

He sprawled out on the sofa with one arm along the back, and put his feet up on the footstool, looking perfectly at home. When Rose sat down, he was pleased to note that she hadn’t placed herself on the opposite side of the sofa, but just a few inches from him.

“So, what d’ya think? We can go anywhere and anywhen you want, your choice.”

Another thought occurred, and he grinned widely.

“If you can’t make a decision, I can always dig up the randomizer and see where she takes us. I’ve done that in the past and had good results. Well… I say good…”

The first time he’d used the randomizer, he’d ended up in yet another encounter with the Daleks. Maybe he shouldn’t have brought that up.

“Or we could throw darts at a map and see how that works out.”

Rose leaned back and the Doctor shifted his arm to avoid touching her bare shoulders, that would be too much temptation. She huffed out a loud breath and tipped her head back to look up at the ceiling. He averted his eyes when she huffed, but couldn’t help picturing the way her breasts must have risen and fallen. When her hair tickled his arm, he considered moving it further, but decided that might offend her, so he left it where it was and tried not to enjoy the sensation too much. While he waited for her answer, he studied her upturned face, a bemused grin playing on his lips, but turned away quickly, when she looked at him.

“Doctor, you said no one else ever got their own en suite. What did you mean?”

The question was unexpected, to say the least, so he shrugged, confused.

“Just what I said. No one else I’ve traveled with ever got their own en suite. The TARDIS just left the loo in the hall and everyone had to share that.”

“So that means… other people have travelled with you before? I mean, long enough to need their own rooms?”

Finally understanding where she was going, he nodded, hoping it wouldn’t be a problem, somehow.

“Yes, quite a few, actually. I've made a lot of friends over the years.”

She chewed her thumb, thoughtfully, for a moment, before finally speaking.

“Tell me about them?”

For some reason, he had expected her to be mad that she wasn’t the first to travel with him. None of his other companions had ever affected him the way Rose was (especially in that _dress_ … she really needed to change), but that didn’t mean she thought of him as anything other than a friend she traveled with. The number of other friends he’d had wouldn’t make any difference to her.

“Well, like I said, there were a lot. What do you want to know?”

“Were any of them… you know…”

She raised her eyebrows and nodded her head from side to side, obviously trying to convey something to him but he had no idea what.

“No… I don’t know. What are you getting at, Rose?”

She rolled her eyes and shook her head, bumping her hip against his.

“Were you _involved_ with any of them, Doctor?”

It took a second to register what she meant. When he did, he jerked his arm down and dropped it to his lap, shaking his head, emphatically. He hoped his thoughts hadn’t betrayed him, somehow.

“No!”

The Doctor worried that he had answered a little _too_ quickly, but Rose simply nodded and put her feet up on the footstool, beside his. It was obviously just a matter of idle curiosity to her and not as important a question as it was to him, but he was glad she knew, just the same.

“So, tell me about some of your other friends.”

Rose turned in her seat to look up at him, expectantly and the Doctor lay his head back against the sofa and closed his eyes. The friends he’d had before were something he usually avoided thinking about, it was too painful. Somehow it was easy to tell Rose about them, though.

He told her about Barbara and Ian, the Fierce Highlander, Jamie and sweet little Victoria. There was proper Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart and spunky Sarah Jane Smith, savage Leela and intelligent, refined Nyssa. He told her about K-9 and Peri, Melanie and Ace, Grace and Time Lady Romana, but left out that there had been two of her. A few were conspicuously absent; he still couldn’t talk about Adric, who had sacrificed himself to save the Earth, which wasn’t even his own home, and Susan, the granddaughter he had stolen away, then left behind.

Everything else fell away as the Doctor spoke for hours about the happy times he’d lived for hundreds of years before the horrors of the war had taken so much away. When he finally stopped talking, he looked down to find that Rose had fallen asleep beside him. Her warm body was curled up against his side and his arm was wrapped around her waist, though he couldn’t say when that either had happened. A stray lock of hair lay across her face and he let his fingers trail lightly across her cheek when he tucked it back behind her ear. She stirred slightly at the touch and shifted against him, mumbling without opening her eyes.

“She sounds lovely, Doctor…”

Smiling to himself, the Doctor shifted to pull her into his lap. She mumbled again, incoherently, but made no objection when he stood up with her in his arms. Carefully, he carried the sleeping girl down the hall to her room and pushed the door open with his foot.

Rose’s room really was more than the TARDIS had given any of his other companions. It was, indeed, bigger than her Mum’s lounge and was decorated in pinks and purples, just like her room back home, but was much more mature and subdued, like something an older Rose may want. The walls were papered in white with pink roses above a white chair rail with pale lavender below. There was a light pink rug on the whitewashed wooden floor that coordinated with a pair of throw pillows on the deep lavender sofa against the wall and another on the honey-wood, four poster bed that dominated the room. Wispy pink and purple gauze draped over the rails connecting the high posts and pale pink sheets were topped by a pink and purple striped duvet, trimmed with roses. A pair of bedside tables topped with pink lamps with white shades and a large armoire in the same honey wood completed the ensemble. The white door opposite where he stood was slightly ajar, showing a sliver of pink and white tile in what must have been the ensuite.

The Doctor carefully lay Rose down and pulled a plush, purple throw from the foot of the bed up and over her. Brushing her hair back again, he stood beside the bed, looking at her for a few moments and reminded himself, again, that he was going to have to be careful about her. The physical reactions he could master, eventually, he would just have to reshore the mental controls he’d let weaken in recent years, but there was something else about her that had nothing to do with how she looked in a corset.

Rose was different in a way he couldn’t define, the TARDIS obviously sensed it too, and it made him nervous. If the TARDIS didn’t think she was a threat, he would assume the same, but he was still going to have to remain on guard around her, for both their sakes.

 

*

 

The Doctor sat on the floor of his own room, trying to meditate. Concentrating on _not_ thinking about Rose only resulted in more visions of red skirts and tongue-touched grins, so he was getting nowhere. After over an hour, he finally growled in frustration and lay back on the floor to stare up at the ceiling, but the memory of that swirling pattern morphing into Dalek ships flashed before his eyes. Eyes shut tightly against the memory, he curled onto his side and tucked his arm under his head. It was a few minutes before he realized he was tired again, even though he had slept the night before, but the thought only formed vaguely before he dozed off.

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

_Red skirts flashed and swirled as Rose danced seductively around him. The smile on her face was as enticing as her bare shoulders and pushed-up breasts. His body ached for her as he took her by the wrists and pulled her closer._

_She pushed him away and stepped back to stand beside Romana. The Time Lady placed herself between him and Rose and advanced on him, her flashing eyes accused as much as her furious voice._

_“Really, Doctor, do you think you’re worthy of such an innocent, young girl? You left your people behind without a word. You stole Susan from Gallifrey, then left her behind and never went back for her, even though you promised you would. You used up all your friends, then threw them away when they no longer amused you. You killed Katrina and Sara. You let Adric_ kill himself _for you_ . _Then, you killed your own people,_ all _of your own people. It doesn’t matter how you try to justify it, you still killed them.”_

_Romana put her arm around Rose and led her to where all the friends who had travelled with him over the years stood, their eyes filled with accusation. Sara, Katrina and Adric’s bodies lay on the floor in front of the group, decaying corpses that turned and stared at him with rotting eyes._

_All his friends fell to the ground and lay in a pile at Rose’s feet, dead._

_Blue ghosts, the Gelth, swarmed into their bodies. They climbed, stiffly, to their feet, and advanced on Rose, gangrenous arms reaching for her._

_She backed away, into a dungeon cell, screaming for his help._

_He had to kill them._

_He had to kill the rest of his friends to save his Rose._

_He turned on the gas and they screamed in pain._

_Their bodies dissolved, leaving Rose alone in the cell, looking at him in horror._

_“I had to, Rose, they were already dead. They had been since the moment they met me.”_

_He fell to the ground, weeping._

_Rose came to him and put a gentle hand on his shoulder._

_“It’s alright, Doctor, I know and I forgive you. I forgive you for all of it.”_

_Rose sat beside him on the floor and kissed him, pressing her lips soft to his. Sighing, he let himself return the kiss for just a moment, before he pulled back._

_“No, Rose, I can’t. I’ll kill you, just like all the others.”_

_She stood before him. The long red skirt swirled around her ankles and the tight corset pushed her breasts up under her smooth, bare shoulders. She beckoned him closer to where she stood against the console._

_Her hands moved achingly slowly as she undid the hooks of the busk down the front of her corset. It fell away. She stood bare before him. She was so beautiful. Her pale breasts rose and fell with each deep breath, pink nipples tight and firm._

_He felt his body reacting and ached to go to her._

_She leaned back against the console and arched her back, putting her breasts on better display._ _Beautiful cinnamon eyes filled with lust gazed at him over her bewitching body._

_He couldn’t resist her any longer._

_They kissed, deeply, tongues swirling against each other, lips nibbling and sucking on lips._ _He kissed her neck and sucked hard enough to leave a mark. He had to mark her as his._ _He pressed her back against the console and maneuvered himself between her legs. He could feel her warm breath against his neck as he slowly pushed himself into her._

_Everything about her was glorious._

_She was so beautiful._

_Her moans filled his ears._ _Her scent filled his nostrils._ _The taste of her lips filled his mouth._ _Her skin was soft beneath his hands._ _He could feel how warm and wet she was around him._

_It was so real… he was sure it was real… please let it be real._

You know it isn’t real.

_He moved inside her, pressing in and pulling out, over and over, all thought gone._

_There was only Rose._

_There was only the beautiful woman against him, around him, moaning as he thrust in and out of her, letting him make love to her._

It will never happen. It _can’t_ ever happen.

_He didn’t care. It was happening now and he didn’t care if it should._

_Rose pulled him tightly against her, her moans growing louder. Urging him on with each movement, she declared over and over how much she wanted him._

_How much she_ loved _him._

She doesn’t, you know that. She never will.

_Soft fingers dug into his shoulders and a sweet face pressed against his neck. Her body began to tremble._

_She cried out in ecstacy and her inner walls clenched around his cock, sending him into an orgasm to match hers._

_The Golden Light exploded from Rose and she burned with it._

_She was beautiful._

_She was terrifying._

_He stood, rooted to the spot as she approached him._ _He wanted to run. He_ needed _to run, but he was held in place by Time._

_Rose and the Golden Light took hold of him and kissed him, deeply._

_The Golden Light enveloped him and he exploded into nothingness._

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

The Doctor woke with a start and sat upright in bed. The bed was drenched with sweat and his cock was painfully erect. That had _never_ happened before.

In an attempt to regain control over his unruly body, he pressed his fingers to his temples and sat on the side of the bed to begin his meditation. If he didn’t regain control over himself soon, he was going to go mad or do something he shouldn’t and drive her away.

During the war, violence and horror had run rampant, and he watched as many of his people fell prey to their call. Ironically, while the others began to embrace their passions, albeit only savage ones, the emotions he had always treasured; hope, joy, friendship, love, even desire, had slowly disappeared from his heart until only despair and hatred had remained. Now, he had no defences against the desires he had previously been able to keep in check, only to be indulged in when he chose. Only when it was appropriate.

Hours passed while the Doctor struggled to reconstruct his neglected defences. When he finally got up, a tenuous resistance was back in place, but he knew it wasn’t enough. There was still a lot to be done and to do it, he needed to be away from Rose. If he took her home, just for a while, she could spend time with her mum and that would give him time to shore up his defences against his desire for her.

A thought struck him and he stopped short: what if, when she got home, she decided she wanted to stay there? What if the danger of these two trips had convinced her that she didn’t want to travel with him anymore? If he took her somewhere that would show her that _everything_ in the universe wasn’t terrifying, he could show her a good time, and convince her to stay with him. And scan it _very_ carefully for signs of danger. Afterwards, he would take her home to see her mum while he worked on reshoring his defenses against her.

With a plan in place, he went back to the console room and began his search for a good destination. A quick trip someplace Rose would enjoy, then home to visit her mum while he meditated, that was what needed to happen. The Doctor whistled to himself as he scanned through all the fun and interesting ( _and safe_ ) places he could think of.

 

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	3. Aliens of London/World War III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor takes Rose back home so she can visit her mother while he works on meditating so he can resist her in dresses. But, as usual, things don’t go exactly to plan and he ends up saying more than he should.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter ended up being a longer than I had planned, so I decided to split it in two. The second half should be up later today or tomorrow.
> 
> Again, thank you to my beta, ScooterThyme and my expert on all things British, dancingonduckstreet. You two are great!

 

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_ It’s strange how dreams get under your skin  _

_ and give your heart a test for what’s real and what’s imaginary _

~Jason Mraz

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

The agrarian planet, Laria, was a nice, safe place throughout its history, so the Doctor decided to take Rose there to attend the annual harvest festival in the village of Idyllic. 

“The village is actually called Idyllic, Doctor?”

“Yeah, it used to be named Sconargenatealindic Vorax, but it is such a nice place that everyone always called it ‘that idyllic village, Sconargentealindic Vorax.’ So, eventually, they just changed their name to Idyllic to save on syllables.”

The annual harvest festival was a big deal for the area and a few hundred people came each year. But, in the grand scheme of things, it was small, out of the way, and of no interest to anyone outside of the community, so the Doctor was fairly sure there wouldn’t be any trouble. He still scanned the 50 years both before and after their visit, just to be safe. 

The festival was just what one would expect such a festival to be. People were selling the bounty of the harvest, supplies needed for the upcoming winter, crafts, and handiwork. Others were hiring out their services for everything from fieldwork to animal husbandry. And peppered throughout the square were entertainers of all sorts, performing for the gathered crowds.

To fit in with the villagers, Rose dressed in the simple clothing that was endemic to agrarian villages throughout time and space; a full skirt of brilliant blue broadcloth that fell just above the ankle and a cream colored blouse with a wide neckline that fell just off the shoulder. The Doctor noted that she wasn’t wearing a bra under it, then chided himself for even looking… and had to force himself not to  _ keep _ looking all day.

The Doctor was examining a cart full of colorful fruits to see if they were safe for Rose to eat when he realized she wasn’t next to him anymore. Visions of armed kidnappers or demonic scarecrows filled his mind and he started searching the square, panic rising every minute. After 5 minutes of frantic searching, he found her behind a stall selling a cross between chickens and dogs. She was crouched in front of a small boy, about the equivalent of 5 Earth years old, who was sobbing into a small stuffed bird. It was obvious the boy was lost and Rose was trying to help him find his family.

The Doctor stood back and let Rose deal with the child, smiling to himself the whole time. If that casual observer from back on Earth was there to see him now, they would identify his smile as that of a man head completely besotted with the girl he was looking at.

After the boy had been successfully reunited with his family, Rose slipped her hand into the Doctor’s, and they continued their perusal of the market. Between two stalls of vegetables sat a tiny, withered old man drawing portraits of people. As they passed, he called out to them.

“Would the happy couple like their portrait drawn? Only 15 delcer.”

The Doctor’s eyes went wide and the tips of his ears reddened. But, when he tried to pull his hand away and object, Rose tightened her hold and grinned at the artist.

“Sure! You’ve got 15 delcer, don’t you Doctor?”

When her tongue appeared between her teeth, he found himself digging in his pocket for coins and grinning a decidedly dopey grin back at her.

“Yeah, might as well. A man needs to ply his trade.”

When they sat on the bench in the artist’s stall, the Doctor tried to keep a few inches between Rose’s hip and his own, but the artist insisted they move closer together and instructed him to put his arm around ‘his sweetheart.’ Again, the Doctor began to object, but Rose just scooted closer and pulled his arm around her waist. The same, dopey grin filled his face, and he pulled her tighter with a pleasant warmth filling him. It took the artist about 10 minutes to draw the picture, and the Doctor grinned broadly the entire time.

When they were presented with the drawing, the Doctor was startled to see that Rose was looking up at him in it, grinning just as broadly as he was. There wasn’t enough detail to be positive, but he was sure he could see the tip of her tongue captured between her teeth. While he stood staring at the picture, Rose took the coins from his hand and gave them to the artist, thanking him happily.

After a long day of enjoying everything the little village of Idyllic had to offer, they returned to the TARDIS, tired, but happy. Dealing with the Gelth had left Rose so tired that the Doctor hadn’t had a chance to give her much of a tour before, so tonight he showed her a few more rooms.

The third door they came to opened onto a medium sized lounge, decorated in the latest style, circa 1985. The matching low backed sofa and loveseat were pale cream with mint green and dusty rose throw pillows arranged in perfect groupings. A darker green, nubby textured recliner rounded out the set. A rectangular coffee table, glass, set into honey brown wood, sat in the center of the room with matching wood end tables on either side of the sofa. The walls were covered with cream, dusty rose, and mint green, zig-zag patterned wallpaper that met a cream ceiling with strategically placed track lighting around the edges. A large, very ugly painting of a crane on a brown background hung from one wall and two sliding windows, edged with frosted geometric lines, were set into the one opposite. The third wall showcased a rough stone fireplace, flanked on one side by a set in bookcase, and the other with top and bottom cabinet doors. The plush, light grey carpet had furrows in it, as if it had recently been hoovered by the lady of the house. The only thing that didn’t look like it was straight out of a home decorating magazine from the ‘80s was the large screen that hung over the fireplace.

Rose squealed with delight when they entered the room and immediately jumped into the recliner and started rocking back and forth.

“This looks just like my Auntie Mo’s lounge! Doctor, can we watch telly? Like, shows from my time?”

When the Doctor told her she could watch any show she wanted, and could even watch ahead, the grin that made him want to do completely inappropriate things with her tongue, made an appearance. After going through the long list of shows the TARDIS gave her, Rose decided they were going to watch X-Factor.

“My mate, Sharine,  _ loves _ this show. She’ll be furious if I guess all the winners right!”

Apparently having grown tired of rocking in the nubby chair, Rose moved to the sofa, and they settled in to watch telly together. The Doctor found that he was completely happy, simply being with her. He was even happier when, halfway through the first episode, she lay back against the sofa arm opposite him and rested her legs across his lap. When the second episode started, she began to droop, and by the time the third started, she had begun to drift off, so the Doctor sent her to bed.

When she was gone, he picked up the picture that was sitting on the table beside the sofa and studied it again. Rose’s tongue was definitely between her teeth. After a few moments of grinning at the picture like an idiot, he shook his head, set it back down and left the lounge. Less than five minutes later, he came back, looking for it, but the picture was no longer on the table. After searching for nearly half an hour, he finally found it hanging on the wall beside the television, in a beautiful, cherry wood frame.

“Right where we’ll always see it when we’re in here. What’re you up to?”

Silence was the only the answer he got, so he made his way to the console room, grumbling to himself about scheming machines and removing various circuits. The thought occurred to him that he should take this time to meditate, but the plan had been to do that while Rose was visiting her Mum, so he went to the work under the console instead.

Nearly ten hours later, he was jerked out of a rather vivid dream by Rose calling to him from the door of the console room. Groggy, and confused at having fallen asleep, he climbed out from under the console to her smiling face. She was back in baggy jeans, t-shirt, and a hoodie, and he wasn’t sure whether to be pleased or disappointed about that. While he had liked ( _ really _ liked) her last two outfits, it was probably for the best that she was wearing something he wouldn’t be so distracted by.

“Earth to Doctor?”

Blinking, he realized he was staring into space and shook his head to clear the images of her previous dresses and the dreams they had inspired. He  _ had  _ to get some time away from her. Hiding his distraction behind a grin, he casually suggested his plan.

“Sorry, there is a problem with the TARDIS’ dematerialization circuit and I was trying to work out a way to fix it. How about a quick trip back to London and you can visit your mum while I work on it?”

_ Good cover.  _ He grinned when she nodded and moved around the console to input the coordinates for London, 2005.

 

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_ 2006… _

That was how the Doctor found himself standing beside the sofa in Jackie Tyler’s lounge, shamefaced, while she screamed at him and a police officer interrogated him. She had every right to be furious with him, and he knew it. So, rather than try to defend himself, he gave an explanation he just hoped wouldn’t make things worse.

“It’s my fault. I sort of employed Rose as my companion.”

“When you say ‘companion’ is this a sexual relationship?”

Wrong choice of words. Visions of black beaded corsets flitted through his mind and he looked down at Rose, hoping that his thoughts weren’t showing on his face.

“No!”

“No.”

His objection to the officer’s question was too fast and much too defensive, but there was a note of derision in Rose’s voice that the Doctor had to try very hard not to take offense at. Far from being appeased, Jackie was getting angrier by the moment. She was beginning to scare him.

“D’you go online and pretend you’re a doctor?”

“I  _ am  _ a doctor.”

“Prove it, stitch this, mate.”

_ SMACK _

_ Jackie Tyler slapped him. _

*

The Doctor was  _ not _ sulking. A time Lord didn’t sulk because a pretty girl’s mother slapped him.

_ Slapped him! _

“Well, if it’s this much trouble, are you going to stay here now?”

Doing his best to look like it didn’t matter, he kept his arms crossed defensively over his chest while he silently pled for her to stay.

“I don’t know… but I can’t do that to her again.”

Rose hadn’t said no, but she hadn’t said yes either, and the Doctor hoped his disappointment didn’t show on his face.  

“Well, I don’t do families.”

“She  _ slapped _ you!”

The Doctor studiously continued to  _ not _ sulk… and he wasn’t whining either.

“900 years of time and space and I’ve never been slapped by someone’s mother. It hurt!”

“When you say 900 years…?

“That’s my age.”

Watching her face, carefully, he tried to gauge her reaction.

“My mum was right, that is one  _ hell  _ of an age gap.”

Could have been worse.

*

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“Nowhere!”

Why did he suddenly feel like he’d just been caught trying to sneak out of her bed at three in the morning?

“It’s just a bit… human in there for me. I’m off on a wander, that’s all.”

“Right, there’s a spaceship on the Thames and you’re just wandering.”

“I’m not interfering because you lot gotta handle this on your own.”

The war between the need to put his nose in and the need to keep Rose safe was making him feel a bit manic and he hoped it didn’t show.

“Promise you won’t disappear?”

Anger flared and his face tightened. Who did this little Earth girl think she was? She didn’t have any claim on him and if he decided he wanted to disappear, that was up to him! But, when he turned to tell her so, the look on her face drove the anger out completely. She  _ did _ have a claim on him, whether she knew it or not. Patting the pockets of his jacket, he looked for a way to let her know he was coming back and quickly found it. The perfect symbol.

“Tell you what, TARDIS key, ‘bout time you had one.”

If the Doctor’s memory served, being given a key to your partner’s flat was a monumental thing in 21st century relationships, so the significance of the gift couldn’t escape her.

Now that he could be relatively sure Rose was out of harm’s way and not worrying about him, he could get back to the job of sticking his nose in.

*

There was no logical reason Ricky the Idiot annoyed him so much, but there was just something about him that set the Doctor’s teeth on edge. The boy wasn’t  _ much  _ stupider than a typical 21st-century ape, but the way he had clung to Rose in that alleyway irritated him. His problem was with Mickey holding Rose back from a better life, not from himself. It was  _ her  _ interest he was thinking of, not his own.

“I bet you don’t even remember my name!”

“Ricky.”

“It’s Mickey.”

It was childish, but the Doctor couldn’t help but bait the boy.

“No, it’s Ricky.”

“I think I know my own name.”

“You  _ think _ you know your own name? How stupid are you?”

That really had been too easy to be so satisfying.

*

“Just answer me this, is my daughter safe?”

Jackie was voicing his own fears. The Doctor couldn’t keep Rose safe, and they both knew it.

Finally, he admitted what he had known all along: he  _ could _ save the world, but the cost would be high.

“There’s a way out, there’s always been a way out.”

“Then why don’t we use it?”

The Doctor addressed his answer to Jackie because he knew she would try to talk him out of it. Rose would jump in, head first, without a thought to how safe  _ she _ would be, but Jackie would tell him it was more important to save Rose than to save the world.

“Because I can’t guarantee your daughter will be safe.”

“Don’t you dare! Whatever it is, don’t you dare!”

The world should be more important than this one girl, but it wasn’t. If he could make Jackie understand that the world was more important, he could do it, he could risk killing Rose. As hard as he tried to convince her to let him do it, though, he desperately wanted her to refuse.

“That’s the thing, if I don’t dare, everyone dies.”

Rose interrupted his plea for understanding.

“Do it.”

The world was worth more than she was and Rose knew it. How could she trust him so much when she knew him so little? If she  _ did _ know him, she would know he wasn’t someone who could be trusted.

“You don’t even know what it is, you’d just let me?”

“Yeah.”

“Please, Doctor, please! She’s my daughter, she’s just a kid.”

She  _ was _ just a kid, and he had no right to have brought her into this in the first place. Just like it did everyone else, his selfishness was going to get her killed. Even though the Doctor knew this was his fault, he still tried to defend himself.

“Do you think I don’t know that? ‘Cause this is my life, Jackie. It’s not fun, it’s not smart. It’s just standing up and making a decision because no one else will.”

The explanation wasn’t for Jackie, it was for Rose. The Doctor was finally telling her what he should have told her before stealing her away from her home and putting her in danger like this. But Rose wouldn’t listen, she put everyone else before herself, as usual.

“What are you waiting for?”

Without thinking, he admitted exactly why he was waiting.

“I could save the world, but lose you.”

Their eyes met and he couldn’t look away. Everything he was feeling showed on his face; the pain he’d already lived through, how he had changed since meeting her, how much he cared for her and how it would break him to lose her now. Did she understand it all? Looking into her eyes, he thought she might be beginning to.

“Except it’s not your decision, Doctor.”

_ Damn Harriet Jones. _

The Doctor had almost convinced himself that he could do it, that it was worth the entire world just to save Rose Tyler. But Harriet Jones reminded him that there was more at stake here than just his hearts.

The Doctor grinned manically. Fine, if he had to risk Rose to save the world, so be it. For once, someone else had made the decision.

*

“Mickey, the Idiot, the world is in your hands. Fire.”

They were going to die. Well, Rose and Harriet were going to die, there was a possibility the Doctor could regenerate, but he wasn’t sure and he honestly didn’t think he wanted to. Not this time. Not again.

“Alright, now I’m making the decision. I’m not gonna die, we’re gonna ride this one out!”

Once again, Rose was the one to break him out of his own despondency. Even though she knew they were almost certainly doomed, she wasn’t going to give up.

Rose, Harriet, and the Doctor piled into the cupboard and he took both their hands. Would it make him a hypocrite to pray to all the deities he’d ever met to keep her safe? He decided he didn’t care and did it anyway.

*

Harriet’s hand slipped from his as they tumbled through the air with no sense of up or down, but the Doctor clung to Rose like a lifeline. She  _ was _ his lifeline. When they finally came to rest, her body was pressed under his, limp and silent and his hearts seized. Harriet shifted on top of him and he shoved her off, cradling Rose’s face in one rough hand.

“Rose…”

In the dim light, he saw her lashes flutter, then her eyes opened. She was alive. His hearts restarted when she smiled weakly up at him. While Harriet shifted around behind him, he trailed his fingers down Rose’s face, in a delicate caress, and whispered in a husky voice he couldn’t blame on the dust.

“I didn’t lose you…”

Harriet bumped into them, pushing the Doctor down further onto Rose, leaving them nose to nose. With a gasp of surprise, Rose grabbed him around the waist, her hands gripping the back of his jumper. She was so close, she filled his senses. Her rapid breaths caressed his cheeks, warm and soft, and their bodies pressed more firmly together with each rise and fall of her chest. Relief that she was alive combined with the adrenaline still flooding his system, and he had to force himself to stop from closing the final distance and crushing his mouth to hers. Harriet interrupted again.

He was beginning to hate that woman.

“Are the two of you alright?”

The Doctor rolled over and checked Rose for signs of injury. A thorough examination would have to wait, so he had to content himself with repeating Harriet’s question.

“Are you alright, Rose?”

With a pained look, she rubbed the back of her head, but still nodded and sat up.

“Yeah, m’alright. You two ok?”

While Harriet confirmed that she was fine, the Doctor stood and offered his hand to Rose so he could help her to her up. Once she was on her feet, he gently pulled her hand from her head so he could feel for a bump or other signs of injury.

“Are you sure your head’s alright? You could have a concussion, I’ll check you out when we get back to the TARDIS.”

Rose grinned up at him and pulled his hand away from her head, but didn’t let go of it.

“I’m fine, Doctor, really. Let’s just get out of this cupboard, yeah?”

He grinned at her and let go of her hand to push the door open. After a few hard shoves, it fell from its hinges into the rubble outside, and they climbed out of the cupboard together. Rose and the Doctor stood together and watched as Harriet Jones charged down the street, shouting her way to leading Britain into the Golden Age.

The Doctor wanted to take Rose’s hand again as they made their way back to her mother’s flat, but thought better of it. After his display in the closet just now, and telling her, her mother, her boyfriend and the future Prime Minister that he cared more for her safety than that of the entire world, he thought it might be best to keep his hands to himself for a while.

*

“Well, you can stay there if you want.”

The Doctor could hear Rose considering over the phone.

“But right now, there’s this plasma storm brewing in the Horsehead Nebula. Fires are burning 10 million miles wide. I could fly the TARDIS right into the heart of it, then ride the shock wave all the way out. Hurtle right across the sky and end up anywhere. Your choice.”

She would come with him, of course she would.  _ Wouldn’t she? _ The Doctor hung up, worried that Rose might not choose to come with him again. If she didn’t, he would just go back to how it had been before her, just him and the TARDIS… alone.

_ Please, Rose, please come with me. _

*

“You’re right, I am dangerous. I don’t want anybody following me.”

“How can you say that and then take her with you?”

_ How could he?  _ He knew he shouldn’t, but he also knew why he had to. His growing feelings for Rose were the reason he made an offer to Mickey that made his insides crawl.

“You could look after her. Come with us.”

“I can’t. This life of yours, it’s just too much, I couldn’t do it.”

With a simple statement of fact, Mickey confirmed what the Doctor had known all along: Mickey Smith had never been worthy of Rose. It would stay just the two of them, the Doctor and Rose Tyler, in the TARDIS, just as it should be.

*

“What if something happens to you, Doctor, and she’s left all alone, standing on some moon a million light years away?”

Once again, Jackie voiced the Doctor’s worst fears.

But he still took her with him.

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	4. Corathean Bazaar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After saving the world from the Slitheen, the Doctor takes Rose surfing on the Horsehead Nebula and they end up on a Bazaar world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the interlude between Aliens of London/WWIII and Dalek. It was originally supposed to be part of the same chapter, but it got too long.
> 
> Again, thanks to my beta, ScooterThyme and my Britishisms expert dancingonduckstreet.

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_ Sleep is the best meditation _

~The Dali Lama

*

_ If it be thus to dream, still let me sleep! _

_ Twelfth Night _  ~ William Shakespeare

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The Doctor went down the hall, laden with Rose’s bags with her trailing behind.

“Right, Horsehead Nebula. If we hurry, we can just make it in time to jump into the middle and ride it out. Have you ever wanted to go surfing?”  


Rose shook her head.  


“Not really, it always sounded kinda dangerous…”  


He stepped to one side so Rose could open the door to her bedroom and smirked.  


“Compared to Gelth, Slitheen and the end of the world? Surfing’s a piece of cake, but if you really don’t want to…”  


Pointing toward the armoire, she gave him a dirty look.  


“Don’t be stupid, of course I want to go. How long will it take to get there?”  


The Doctor grunted as he set the heavy bags beside the armoire, then dropped onto the bed, rubbing his back.  


“Blimey, you’ve got a lot of stuff! Did you leave anything at your mum’s?”  


Rose rolled her eyes and sat down beside him.  


“Yeah. I just brought what I thought I’d need, this is nowhere near all my stuff.”  


The Doctor rolled his eyes at the pile of bags and shook his head, but didn’t comment further.  


“You keep forgetting that this is a time machine. We can leave now and get there before it starts or we can leave in an hour and get there at the same time.”  


Rose slid her arm through the crook of his elbow and rest her head on his shoulder.  


“So that means we have time to get something to eat… maybe take a quick nap? Saving the world isn’t as easy as it sounds.”  


Looking down at her, the Doctor smiled a bit. He did have a tendency to forget that humans needed to eat and sleep more often than he did. It had been a while since he’d had one around to remind him, but Rose did so on a regular basis by dragging him to the galley or falling asleep in front of the television. Recently, he was also finding that he needed to sleep more often, himself. That was probably something he should worry about, but after the last dream he had, he was more interested in sleep than he usually was.  


“Sure, we have time. How about we have breakfast, then go plasma surfing, and then you can take a nap?”  


Without even thinking about what he was doing, he took his arm from hers and slipped it around her waist. She responded by leaning against him without missing a beat. It wasn’t until she snuggled against him that he realized what he’d done and by then, there was no way to back out, so he just let himself enjoy holding her.  


“Yeah, sounds good, but why breakfast? It was past teatime when we left Mum and Mickey.”  


Rose twisted to look up at him without moving his arm from around her and gave him a quizzical look. The mention of her boyfriend made an unfamiliar emotion bubble up in him, one that he refused to examine long enough to identify, so he shrugged and answered her question instead.  


“Because I feel like waffles and bacon.”  


Her laughter, and the way her tongue peeked between her teeth when she grinned, drove away the unnamed emotion and any thought of Ricky the Idiot. She stood and took his hand to pull him to his feet and they left the room together. They held hands as they went to the galley and he tried not to think about how nice it felt to have her soft hand in his.  


When they arrived at the galley, waffles, bacon, and eggs were already laid out in the chafing dishes. His plate with the blue cats and hers with wispy wildflowers were sitting on the counter in front of the food, waiting to be filled. To round out the meal, two cups of tea, prepared just the way they each liked it, were ready and waiting on the table. They piled food onto their plates, and while they ate, the Doctor tried to explain what a plasma storm was.  


After an hour of unsuccessfully trying to bring Rose’s education up to a level that would help her understand how superheated interstellar gasses expanded and exploded from a center mass, the Doctor finally gave up.  


“It’s like a massive storm on the ocean, but in space, and we’ll ride it out from the center like riding on a surfboard.”  


“But, wouldn’t riding a surfboard in the middle of a storm be dangerous?”  


“Very. Should we go to the cinema instead?”  


The Doctor grinned broadly when Rose got to her feet and reached for his hand again. Lacing their fingers together, they took off down the hallway toward the console room, laughing as if they rode a funfair ride. After jostling against each other down halls that seemed to twist and turn a little more than usual, they came to a halt by crashing into the console. With a manic grin, the Doctor input the coordinates and turned on the viewscreen.  


“This will look as fantastic as it’s going to feel, so take a seat and watch the screen. Fantastic or not, it’s gonna get bumpy.”  


The viewscreen filled with deep blue, purple and black swirling clouds that seethed and roiled across the sky. The darkness was sprinkled with what could have been stars, but they flared brightly, then extinguished and reappeared like no star ever did. Over and over the lights sparked, disappeared and returned, leaving bright spots in their vision. Lurid red streaks, like giant fireballs, tore through the inky clouds, exploding at random in brilliant firework blasts. The surrounding clouds were lit into sparkling vapor that shimmered brightly before fading back into the dark, swirling fog. Glimmering white mist crackled through the darkness like ghostly breath, then faded back into nothingness, leaving the caliginous clouds glowing faintly before returning to swirling darkness.  


Staring in awe at the breathtaking spectacle on the viewscreen, Rose’s mouth hung open and she stood rooted in place until the Doctor pulled her down into the jumpseat with him. He wrapped one arm tightly around her waist and took hold of the side of the seat with his other hand.  


“Hold on, Rose!”  


The seething clouds began to billow and undulate like waves crashing across the ocean, before finally erupting in all directions and flinging the TARDIS violently across the sky. Rose screamed and grabbed hold of the Doctor, clinging to his neck with both arms while the room shook and juddered around them. She shrieked, half thrilled, half terrified, as her body jerked into the air. His arm tight around her waist was the only thing keeping her from flying across the room.  


Another sharp jolt pulled her harder away from him, and without thinking, he grabbed for her with his other arm. Together, they hurtled across the room. She clung tighter to him, pressing her face into his chest as they flew through the air, laughing and screaming until they slammed into the far wall. Another violent shudder threw them in the air before they finally dropped to rest on the floor.  


It took a few moments of gasping for air and laughing with her for the Doctor to realize he was laying on top of Rose and her arms were still wrapped around him. It was the second time in just a handful of hours he had found himself in this position. He caught his breath faster than she did, leaving him time to look down at her flushed, glowing face and hold her, in what felt so much like an intimate embrace. It would be easy just to lean down and press his lips to hers, to take advantage of his position and kiss her the way he had been dreaming about. What would happen if he did?  


Her chest still heaving, Rose finally looked up at him and their eyes locked together. Again, she filled his senses. Her soft curves fit against the hard planes of his body just as perfectly as her hand did in his. Under the heavy, artificial floral of her Fragrance Shop perfume was the scent that was just Rose. It was better than anything he had ever smelled before. Her warm, cinnamon eyes bored into his with an intensity he’d never felt in a single look.  


Just like in Downing Street, he knew she trusted him completely, would let him do anything he wanted, and the desire to kiss her nearly overwhelmed him. Just as he had himself convinced that he could, that she would let him, a loud grating noise and an explosion of sparks from the console pulled their gaze apart and the moment was lost.  


The jumpseat was lodged against the console with sparks and smoke exploding randomly from the damage, and the rotor moved up and down in fits and stops with a sickening grating noise accompanying each movement. The Doctor ran across the room and started pulling on the jumpseat, but it was wedged in tightly.  


“Rose, take the other side and help me!”  


Together, they managed to pull the seat free from the console and he immediately slid under to inspect and start to repair the damage. When Rose spoke, he barely registered the sound around his worry about his TARDIS.  


“Is she alright, Doctor? Is she going to be okay?”  


A distracted grunt came from under the console, but that was the only time he acknowledged her presence for hours.

*

When he finally slid out from under the console, Rose was curled up on the floor in front of one of the coral struts with two cups sitting in front of her. Without standing, the Doctor scooted across the metal grating and picked up one of the cups, it was cold. He set it back down and gently shook Rose’s shoulder.  


“Rose, wake up. Rose.”  


She stirred and opened her eyes, then sat up and stretched.  


“How’s the TARDIS? She gonna be alright?”  


He got to his feet, then offered his hand to help her up.  


“I think so, the damage is mostly superficial. None of the critical systems were damaged, so she should be alright **,** but I still wanna give her a bit of a rest.”   


Together, they moved to the console and he examined the display. After a few moments, he pointed to the screen.  


“There. Corathe VII is a great place for a visit, the entire planet is one giant bazaar. There are entertainments of every kind from street performers to formal plays, food from all over the galaxy and stalls selling everything you can imagine.”  


“A planet that is one big bazaar? How bizarre.  


When she grinned at her joke, her tongue poked between her teeth and his gaze dropped to her mouth. His thoughts wandered, not for the first time, to how it would feel to catch that tongue with his lips. When he realized that he was staring, he cleared his throat and turned back to the controls, patting his jacket pocket.  


“And this time, I have money. All we have to do is find a cashpoint.”  


While he sent the TARDIS toward the bazaar, Rose moved down the hall, calling over her shoulder.  


“I tore my jeans when we went across the console. I’m gonna go change while you fly us to the planet, yeah?”  


Before the Doctor could correct her about the TARDIS ‘flying’, Rose had disappeared down the hall. While he waited for her to return, he dragged the jumpseat across the floor to slot it back in where it belonged. It took a few minutes to wrestle it back into place and by the time he was done, Rose had reappeared. Once again, he was caught off guard by her change of clothing.  


She wore a form-fitting top with thin straps made of silky, pink material that clung to her body enticingly. The thin material made it obvious that she was again, not wearing a bra. The curves of her breasts were clear and he was sure that he would be able to see her nipples if he moved closer. He wasn’t sure if that thought made him want to get closer to her or stay as far away as possible. The top was tucked into a denim skirt that could barely be described as a skirt, as the frayed hem was just a few inches past the lower curve of her backside. While he’d always preferred long skirts, he was beginning to see the appeal of short ones. Bright pink tights covered her shapely legs and thick-soled, white trainers with pink stripes that matched her tights were laced onto her feet.  


The Doctor couldn’t help but stare and stood dumbly, his eyes wandering over her body until she spoke.  


“So, are we ready to go?”  


His head jerked slightly when he forced his eyes back up to hers and he hoped his body hadn’t betrayed his thoughts. Since the Doctor had met Rose, it seemed he spent half his time trying to get his body back under control and the other half trying to keep it under control. Meditation wasn’t helping anything.  


Keeping his back to her so he wouldn’t get distracted again, he opened the door and led her into the planet-wide bazaar. The scene around them was exactly what a bazaar should be: loud, excited, brightly colored and full of smells of every kind. Rose slipped her hand into his and grinned up at him, thrilled with the chaos surrounding them. A smile quirked his lips as he watched her trying to look everywhere at once.  


“It’s amazing, Doctor! Oh! What are these?”  


Without stopping for his answer, Rose tugged him toward a stall displaying oddly shaped, iridescent blobs that squished and bounced of their own accord while emitting strange groans and brightly colored steam. The Doctor had to grab her wrist to keep her from touching them before he could warn her that they were poisonous.  


For the next three hours, the Doctor followed Rose as she pulled him from stall to stall, examining everything she could see. She laughed at the brightly colored balloons that sang nursery rhymes from every planet in the galaxy. The animals that looked like sweet, pastel colored kittens made her coo until she found that their fur was sharp and they breathed fire when they meowed. He avoided touching the books that wrote out what was in your mind, like an automatic diary, but tried to read the one Rose picked up. Before he could angle his head enough to see, he was pushed out of the way by a large Adiposian man, and she dropped it back on the table with a gasp before he could get back around. They were both tempted by the shimmering, nearly see-through dresses that conformed themselves to the wearer’s body in the perfect way to accent their figure. Despite, or perhaps because of, how much he wanted to see her in one, he adamantly refused her pleas to buy one.    


He indulged most of her desires but refused the ones that were dangerous or wildly impractical. Her pouting made him give in on a few, but he stood firm on most of them.  


There were food stalls selling every kind of food and drink imaginable, and a few that should never have been imagined. Rose tried as many things as she could, delighting over some and making faces of disgust at others until she was full to bursting. When she couldn’t eat any more, she contented herself with smelling them and asking the Doctor what they tasted like.  


While Rose was examining airy scarves in every color, the Doctor idly glanced over the neighboring stall. Bottles of every size, shape, and color were littered across the table with small, paper sticks stacked in front of each. Setting Rose’s bags on the ground at his feet, he began to inspect the bottles more closely; they held perfume of every kind. Some were fruity or floral and others were musky and earthy while others were repulsive to his senses.  


A bottle twisted into a double helix that held a crystal clear liquid caught his attention. He examined it for a moment then picked up a paper strip from in front of the neighboring bottle. When he applied the perfume to the strip and brought it to his nose, however, there was no smell. Setting the bottle back down with a shrug, he began to turn away, when the salesperson saw him.  


“That is a very special perfume, sir, it doesn’t smell like anything until it is applied to a person and then it enhances their natural scent. It’s a favorite, but it is very expensive. I have smaller bottles if the large one would be too much for you.”  


The assumption that he would want to buy a bottle made the Doctor grin, but a glance in Rose’s direction dissolved the grin immediately. Glowering, he turned his attention back to the salesperson. They were a Banzern, a genderless lizard-like person with green scaled skin and long yellow hair. They were rather attractive and, since Rose was busy being chatted up by some blue-haired, pretty-boy salesman at the scarf stand, the Doctor turned on a bright grin and held the bottle toward them.  


“What does it smell like on you?”  


The Banzern grinned back, revealing two rows of pink, pointed teeth and a long, green tongue tucked behind them.  


“I will happily demonstrate it for you, sir, but it doesn’t really matter what it smells like on me. What matters is how it smells on the person you are buying it for.”  


They glanced, pointedly, toward Rose, and grinned again. The knowing look both annoyed and pleased the Doctor, but before he had a chance to deny or confirm the implication, Rose turned from the scarf stand and stepped over to them.  


“Doctor, can I get one of these scarves? They keep you warm but aren’t heavy or scratchy and Grishen here says this blue one makes my eyes… Oh, perfume!”  


The eyes Grishen seemed to admire lit with excitement and the scarves were forgotten as Rose leaned past the Doctor to examine the bottles. Her hip pressed against his crotch as she bent over and he barely stifled a groan but stood firm. When he suddenly realized just how much he was enjoying the sensations the pressure sent through him, he stepped back and tried to discreetly adjust his trousers against any outward signs of that enjoyment. The Doctor looked back up to find the salesperson was sliding their eyes between the bottle in his hands and Rose and grinning at him, knowingly.  


_ Smug git. _   


The Doctor held the double helix bottle toward Rose and tried to keep his voice even.  


“Try this one, it smells different on everyone. Let’s see how it smells on you.”  


She was holding a vibrant pink, heart-shaped bottle with hundreds of tiny glass flowers spilling down the sides and smelling a paper strip. When the Doctor spoke, she set both down and took the bottle from him, giving it a quick sniff.  


“It doesn’t smell like anything.”  


With a grin, he teased her.  


“That’s ‘cause no one is wearing it right now. Here.”  


The Doctor applied a small amount of the perfume to his fingers, then touched them to the pulse point on the left side of Rose’s neck. Under his light touch, her skin warmed slightly and the delicate flutter of her heartbeat quickened. Their eyes met and he slowly moved his hand to the other side of her neck and gently brushed his fingers along the skin there. Goosebumps pebbled her skin and she shivered slightly, but never took her eyes from his.  


Finally dropping his hand, he leaned closer, until his lips were almost touching her neck, and inhaled deeply. The scent was intoxicating. Other perfumes covered a person’s natural scent in heavy musks or cloying florals, but this was only Rose, pure, breathtaking, exquisite Rose. His hands itched to touch her and he ached with the need to hold her. The few, tattered threads of self-control he had left frayed further as he struggled to resist the pull of this scent  


“Do you like it?”  


Her voice was soft and expectant. When the Doctor finally straightened to looked down at her, her cheeks were flushed a delicate pink and her eyes were bright and shimmering. It wasn’t just Rose’s scent, everything about her captivated him and he couldn’t take his eyes off her.  


A small voice somewhere in the back of his mind warned him that this perfume was dangerous, that he should buy one of the sickly sweet, girlish perfumes on display instead, but everything else in him was pleading to buy it. He needed to take this back with them and have her wear it every moment of every day. The war between thought and need was won when a husky, ragged voice answered before he could stop it  


“Yes.”  


_ Pheromones. Pheromone enhancing perfume. _   


The words drifted through the Doctor’s dulled thoughts and he knew they should mean something, but his brain was shutting down. Rose was the only thing he was aware of; her upturned face with slightly parted lips, her warm cinnamon eyes that never left his, and her  _ scent _ … Another deep breath left his brain fuzzier than any substance he’d ever consumed.   


Rose’s tongue, always teasing him in the corner of her grins, slid slowly across her lips and he followed it with his eyes, entranced. Those ruby lips formed words slowly, deliberately, as if she was struggling to remember how to speak. Distracted by her lips, he struggled to remember how to hear.  


“Do you really like it?”  


Seemingly oblivious that they were getting involved in a conversation that had little to do with perfume anymore, the salesperson interjected, helpfully.  


“It smells lovely on you, miss. This perfume is formulated to smell perfect on each wearer. Satisfaction is guaranteed.”  


Barely registering the salesperson’s words, the Doctor shoved the bottle across the table, desperate to get them to stop talking.  


“We’ll take it.”  


Pulled by an invisible force, the Doctor took a half step closer to Rose and one hand drifted to slide slowly across the bare skin of her arm. Another half step forward left their bodies separated by a single breath. Held in thrall by the soft skin under his hand, he raised the other to rest gently on her hip. As if in preparation for a kiss, Rose’s head tipped back and her lips parted, but before he could close that final distance, the salesperson cut in, brightly and held the bag out to them.  


“Your perfume, sir, miss. Sir? Sir?”  


The words worked their way into his consciousness and the Doctor turned his head to the salesperson. After a moment of dazed staring, his mind cleared and he stepped back, dropping his hands from Rose’s body and took the offered bag.  


“Yes… thank you.”  


The Doctor’s voice was gruff, but the salesperson chirped back a cheerful, “Have a nice day!” while he shoved the perfume bag in with the others. Without looking at Rose, he loaded the bags up so she couldn’t try to take his arm again, and headed down the street. As he wove his way through the crowd, he berated himself for buying the perfume. Something like this was bound to happen every time she wore it, and there wouldn’t be a pushy salesperson around to rescue him every time.  


The first time he thought to see if Rose had been able to keep up with him, was when he arrived at the TARDIS doors. Looking over his shoulder, he was relieved to see her behind him.  


“Can you open the…”  


Before he could finish his sentence, she had pushed past him, opened the door and hurried into the TARDIS. After pushing the door shut behind him with his foot, the Doctor followed her up the ramp but was startled to see that she had already disappeared down the hall. He shifted the heavy bags and followed her down the hall, but stopped short when he came to her closed door.  


“Rose, I can’t open the door with all this. Rose!”  


He tapped at the door with his foot a few times before finally grumbling and twisting until he had shifted the bags enough to open the door. When he went into the room, he found it empty and dark, but there was a light shining under the door of the en suite. With a frustrated huff, he moved across the room and dropped the bags on the bed, calling toward the door, angrily.  


“Could’ve at least left the door open, I’m not a bloody pack mule!”  


He was met with silence.  


Growling audibly, he stalked from the room and slammed the door behind him.  


_ What is it about human females that makes them so prone to ridiculous mood swings? Especially the young ones! _   


The thought reminded him just how  _ young _  a human female Rose was. Maybe if he could keep Rose’s youth in mind when she was around, it would keep him from acting like a horny, old git and  _ sniffing _  her all the time.   


_ Not bloody likely. _   


Of course. That was why she had locked herself in the loo; to keep him away. A horny, old git sniffing and groping her in the street would make any girl want to hide. As he made his way down the hall to his room ( _had the distance from Rose’s room to his gotten shorter?)_ , he thought of as many insults as he could to apply to himself, and then did so in as many languages as he could think of.  


*  


Upon entering his room, he leaned back against the door and banged his head against it a few times, then pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes until stars popped in his vision.  


Meditation was supposed to help, it always had when he needed to overcome distractions before, but every time he sat down and tried to clear his mind, either she overtook his thoughts or he dozed off and started dreaming of her. If he didn’t know better, he would think there was some outside force at work, but he would know if his mind was under attack. This was just his own lack of self-control where Rose was concerned.  


After banging his head against the hard wooden door a few more times, just for good measure, he decided distraction was the best course of action and walked over to his work table. Usually he had no trouble deciding which project he wanted to work on, but lately, he’d been having trouble concentrating on anything. For a few minutes, he just stared at the various items in front of him, blankly. The only thing he could think about was Rose, as usual. Her pink top and the smell of the perfume were at the forefront of his mind, unsurprisingly, but the closed door in the dark room was also worrying him.  


With a frustrated grunt, he smacked his hand against a water tap with its handle removed, sending it flying into the husk of a microwave, the door of which promptly slammed shut, closing the tap inside. He frowned down at the amalgamation and wondered, idly, if it could be made into something useful. After a few moments of contemplation, he decided a combination microwave/water tap was a ridiculous idea and shoved it aside, knocking over various other half-finished projects in the process. This was getting him nowhere.  


The Doctor blew out a heavy breath and dragged his hands down his face. When the tips of his fingers passed over his nose, he thought he caught the scent of the perfume he’d applied to Rose’s neck not long ago. His fingers twisted until the tips were against his nostrils and he inhaled deeply. He swore he could almost, not quite, but just about smell the remains of the perfume and his body began to respond to the memory of her scent and the feel of her skin. When he realized his hand was in his lap, pressing against a growing erection, he groaned and leaned forward to bang his head against the table. This was becoming far too frequent a problem.  


Scrubbing his hands back up his face and over his head, he scratched his scalp, hard, to try to distract himself, then got up and began to pace. Because of the Slitheen, he’d never had the chance to focus on shoring up his defenses against his desire for her, so he knew he should meditate. He also knew he would very likely end up falling asleep and dreaming about Rose, again.  


_ Would that really be such a bad thing? _   


On his third pass beside his bed, his attention was drawn to the highly unusual fact that it was still unmade. The TARDIS normally made his bed for him whenever it got messed up, but the dark blue duvet and black sheets were still twisted and rumpled from when he had been tossing and turning in his sleep days ago. The Doctor stared at the unmade bed for a long time, and finally, came to a decision. If he was going to end up asleep and dreaming of Rose, no matter what he did, he would just skip trying to meditate and go straight to the dreaming.  


His jacket made a heavy sound when it landed on the chair, quickly followed by the thudding of his boots as he kicked them off beside the bed. He considered for a moment before pulling his jumper off and tossing it to join his jacket, leaving him bare-chested. The dark red woolen top missed the chair and fell to the floor beside it, but he didn’t care enough to pick it up and climbed into the bed, instead.  


As the Doctor settled himself down against his pillow, he realized that, for the first time in memory, he was actually eager to spend hours doing nothing but sleeping. That probably should have been concerning, but it really, really wasn’t.  


 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*  


  


_ Sitting at a stall between scarves and bright fruit, the handsome Banzern sold him a portrait of Rose, grinning at him seductively. It was scented with her perfume and he breathed it in. _

_ Her scent enveloped him. _   


_ Rose. _   


_ She was nearby, he could smell her, she had to be close. _   


_ She sat above him, moving up and down as she rode him, deliciously slowly. She was glorious. Her hair framed her face in a halo that glowed with golden light. With an expert twist of her hips, she sent thrills of pleasure through him that radiated out to every cell in his body. _   


_ He found his hands and slid them up her hips to pull her down, tighter against him while he pushed up into her. Her head lolled to the side and she moaned in pleasure, the sound sending new waves of pleasure chasing the last. The angle of his cock inside her changed as she leaned down to kiss him. He moaned deeply into her mouth, swallowing her responding moan as he returned the kiss, hungrily. _   


_ His hands slid up her body, reveling in the softness of her curves as he made his way from her hips to her head. He pulled her hair gently and she moaned into his mouth again. Her tongue ran along his lips before dipping into his mouth and her taste flooded over him the same way her scent had. He felt drunk on her, he would never have enough. _   


_ She shifted to support herself on her hands at either side of his head and pressed her forehead to his. Her warm, cinnamon eyes locked on his. He could feel her mind, just out of reach, and longed to feel more of it. _   


_ Her hips twisted against him again and he groaned. He felt his orgasm approaching faster with each movement. His hands found her wonderfully soft backside and gripped it tightly while he pushed up into her, harder, desperate for release. _   


_ Feeling his need, she sat back up and began moving faster. With every other hard downward press, she undulated her hips against him, drawing more pleasure from him than he thought he had. _   


_ She took his hands and moved them to her breasts, pressing them firmly into her soft flesh. He kneaded and pulled her warm, soft breasts and pinched each tight nipple, peppering her moans with little yelps of pleasure. _   


_ She drove her body down onto his and he pushed up into her, chasing the climax of his pleasure. _   


_ She glowed from the inside with golden light and it enveloped him as their bodies exploded together in ecstasy. _   


_ She dissolved into nothingness. _   


_ The Idyllic village erupted into chaos as the Slitheen crashed through it, killing and destroying everything in their wake. Panic gripped him as he ran through the village, searching for Rose. _   


_ A small boy stood in the square, crying into a stuffed toy, abandoned by his family. A tall Slitheen advanced on him, licking its lips, evilly. _   


_ The Doctor cried, soundlessly, for her to stop, but Rose ran to the boy, placing herself between the tiny child and the hulking, green alien. _   


_ Time slowed as Rose wrapped herself, protectively, around the boy and the Slitheen descended on them both. _   


_ Mickey hurled missiles at the village under the Doctor’s orders and she screamed in fear and pain. _   


_ The world spun on its axis and exploded, and Rose’s hand slipped from his. _   


_ He wandered through the ruins of the village, looking for signs of Rose. _   


_ He found her at a stand selling scarves, chatting with Mickey. The idiot’s hands were all over her while she smiled at him, with her tongue between her teeth. _   


_ She didn’t look at the Doctor as she slipped her hand into Mickey’s and they walked away, leaving him standing in the crowded street, alone. _   


_ Their laughter rang in his ears. _   


_ And her scent enveloped him. _   


  


*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

  


The Doctor woke with a start, then groaned loudly and pulled a pillow over his head. He knew there was a reason to hate sleep and dreaming, he’d just forgotten what it was. Dreams were unpredictable and never what you expected. Visions of death and destruction were completely normal for him, but this dream had left him shaken, annoyed, frustrated and very, very aroused. No, he wasn’t aroused, he was  _ randy _ , plain and simple. If this was what human adolescent boys had to live with, he was beginning to have a lot more sympathy for the whole ridiculous bunch.

Scrubbing his hands over his face, he rolled over and sat up; the movement brought the fact that he was hard very much to the forefront of his attention. One more reason to feel sorry for the randy teenage lot. Maybe it wasn’t entirely their own fault they were constantly trying to chat someone up. The thought brought Ricky the Idiot to mind… and the pretty boy scarf salesman… and  _Charles Dickens,_  for that matter  _(he still couldn’t believe_   _she’d kissed him)_  and he decided he could fault a few of them for chatting people up. The fact that he didn’t seem able to control himself around Rose Tyler, either, didn’t seem to garner them any sympathy in his eyes.  


Last time this happened, he’d meditated for hours to try to overcome his body’s urges and still ended up with the same problem just a few hours later. His reactions when he was with Rose hadn’t been any better, either. If anything, keeping his hands to himself had been more difficult over the past few days. Obviously, meditation hadn’t helped.  


The Doctor disentangled himself from his sheets and stood, then headed to his en suite. Since this was obviously a problem human teenage boys had more than a passing acquaintance with, maybe he’d try one of their solutions. As he stripped out of his jeans and pants and climbed into the ice cold shower, he hoped this solution would work and he wouldn’t be forced to take more desperate measures. The humanity of  _ that  _ solution would be entirely too degrading.   


  


*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*


	5. Dalek

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor and Rose grow closer, but an encounter under the Salt Flats of Utah threatens the changing relationship.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

_There were dragons in his dreams_

_As though some part of him knew the trials were not yet over_

_That there were battles yet to be fought._

_Lucky Day ~_ Barry Lyga

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

  


They never talked about the closed door. As much as the Doctor wanted to apologize to Rose, he could never make himself bring up the topic, so he just left it alone.

They never talked about the bazaar either, and the perfume never made an appearance. The Doctor wasn't sure whether to be happy about that or not. On one hand, he knew that he was likely to get into trouble if she wore it, on the other, he _really_ liked it.

Aside from those small problems, things had been going well. They spent their time finding new places to go, things to do, and trouble to get into. Basically, they had fun, and everywhere they went, Rose did something new that endeared her to the Doctor even more.

On Mac Tire, she helped him drag a young mother out of her burning home; whining cries had turned to barks of joy when the pup’s mother was returned to them. Claiming children never liked him, the Doctor had left Rose to let them lick her hand, only to be waylaid by the grateful mother, himself. While the Maktak woman licked the Doctor's face and thanked him over and over, Rose had sat with the children, grinning at him with her tongue between her teeth. Somehow, the experience hadn’t been as bad as he’d expected it to be.

When she’d passed a frantic woman on Yeyedrey, Rose had stopped to see what was wrong. It had turned out that the woman’s eyeglasses had wandered off, and she wasn’t able to get home or cook her dinner without them. Rose had spent hours leading the Drey woman through the city looking for them, while the Doctor investigated the disappearance of a large number of Yeye citizens. When the woman was finally reunited with her glasses, she had insisted on feeding Rose and the Doctor a full five-course meal, before sending them on their way with bags of treats. The Doctor had been very glad they’d found her glasses, as they seemed to help her a lot with the cooking.

Everywhere they went and everything they did, Rose was always fantastic… even if she was constantly wandering off and getting herself into trouble. While none of his companions had been able to stay put, The Doctor had never traveled with anyone so jeopardy friendly as Rose.

After Biloga had been reunited with her puppies, the Doctor had told Rose to stay put, but a voice calling for help sent her running off into the burning village without him. When she came upon the man who’d set the fire, she had nearly been burned to death herself. But, her wandering had led to the discovery that the fire was a demonstration against intermarriage between humans and the native, dog-like Maktak people.

In her search for Canavar’s eyeglasses, Rose had stumbled into a gang of thugs, bent on kidnapping the planet's sentient eyeglass population and selling them into slavery. It was only the fact that the Doctor had been looking for the same gang that kept her from being carted off to another planet, along with the old woman's glasses.

Every time Rose wandered off, at least one of the Doctor’s hearts seemed to stop. It happened so often, he was beginning to think he might have a heart attack.

_One more all-too-human human thing she’s doing to me._

After each adventure came the Doctor's new favorite pastime: being with Rose.

Eating in the galley was nice. Rose gradually tried more alien foods and found she liked quite a few, though not everything was to her taste. The TARDIS pouted every time her favorite, maqrezingtl, was refused. Ever since Rose's first meal on the TARDIS, the purple sausages in bright pink gravy appeared, but she wrinkled her nose every time. It wasn't just the greasy, psychedelic look of it she objected to; she claimed it smelled like the boy’s changing room of her school's football team. When the Doctor questioned how she knew what that smelled like, she just gave him her tongue-in-teeth grin and refused to answer.

Reading in the library was another favorite. The Doctor tried to get Rose to read about unfamiliar cultures, both on Earth and off, but she was much more interested in the fiction section. There was a standing argument about why they couldn’t go back and get JK Rowling to change most of The Order of the Phoenix. The Doctor kept trying to explain how changing it would alter events so that the Augur Act of 2251 would never be written, and the future history of Vaticination would be set back by nearly 400 years. But, Rose just couldn’t, or wouldn’t, understand. Nevertheless, they enjoyed reading the series out loud to each other. When they’d finished, the Doctor was able to convince her to read a Kazami series with a very similar premise, but with painting, rather than magic.

The Doctor's favorite activity, by far, was sitting in the lounge together, watching shows from throughout time and space on the telly. Rose still enjoyed watching X Factor, but they also watched a variety of other shows. The Doctor had been surprised when Rose enjoyed his favorite Martian nature show, and even more so when she began requesting it.

At first, they sat on the sofa together with the Doctor at one end and Rose at the other. Sometimes, she curled up against the arm opposite him, and sometimes she lay back and put her feet in his lap. One night, while they were watching a Surugulan musical, Rose slid over, pulled his arm around her, and snuggled up against his side. Cuddling had been the accepted position for television watching ever since. The Doctor tried not to let on how much he enjoyed it, but he couldn't help pulling her closer, and that often led to problems. More than once, he'd stayed in the lounge long after she left, just to be sure she didn't notice how much of a problem it was.

The dreams were wonderful, especially after the cuddling began, but they were also a problem. The memory of them frequently distracted him from important things and ended up getting him into trouble. A particularly intense dream about a green corset had distracted him while he was installing a new capacitor on the Oolion generator, and the resulting burns on his left hand took nearly two weeks to heal. As if the distraction wasn't enough, the cold water suddenly failed in every shower he could find, with no apparent cause. When he brought it up with Rose, however, she claimed to have no such problem. The Doctor was sure the TARDIS was up to something, but he couldn’t figure out what scalding hot showers were meant to accomplish.

Another problem the Doctor noticed was the apparent connection between the all too frequent appearance of Ricky the Idiot in his dreams, and the behavior of the people around him. Every time the boy was featured, everyone seemed to act very strangely for days, and it was beginning to worry him.

In hindsight, he realized that telling Rose the prince of Dili’i Malobo wasn’t blue enough, within earshot of the monarch, had been a bad idea. But, it had been a complete over reaction on the prince’s part to demand the Doctor’s head for the insult to his honor. As irritating as the prince kissing Rose’s hand when they were introduced had been, the dance she'd had to agree to in order to keep the Doctor from being hanged was infuriating. He couldn’t understand how she withstood the affront.

The incident with the Maloboan prince was just one in a long line of strange predicaments the Doctor found himself in since Rose had joined him. Trouble wasn’t unusual in his life, but the sudden increase was alarming.

There were also the nightmares to contend with. Alongside the visions of the Time War that still haunted him, were images of Rose being hurt or dying. The countless ways his mind came up with to torture and kill Rose in his dreams would have made any psychiatrist question whether he was sane. That was a question the Doctor had had for years.

All in all, their trips had gone well, aside from the Slitheen… and the Gelth… and despite Rose’s complaints, the Impisi Forest hadn’t been _that_ bad. It was meant to be a treat. A sparkling pink and purple forest inhabited by fairies should have been exactly the sort of thing she would love. How she expected the Doctor to know it would be hit by the worst beezle bug swarm in a hundred years as soon as they got there was beyond him. Her anger completely baffled him. It had only taken him 3 hours to get all the tiny gnats out, and it couldn’t have taken her _that_ much longer.

*

Even though he didn't understand Rose’s anger, the Doctor tried to appease her by taking her to the Kookol music festival on Awon VII.

From her place on the jumpseat, Rose watched the Doctor as he input coordinates and explained where they were going.

“Awoni folk music is a sort of a cross between Beethoven and the Spice Girls and it’s renowned throughout the galaxy. You’ll love it, Rose. They hold a festival to celebrate it every year and anyone who wants to come is invited. It’s a lot like Woodstock, but without the sex and drugs.”

He stopped and stared at the rotor, thoughtfully before shrugging.

“I suppose there really isn’t any rock and roll either, but aside from that, it’s exactly like Woodstock.”

Once they landed, he leaned back against the console in front of her with his arms crossed over his chest. One look was enough to tell him that staring was going to be a problem again today. Her jeans were just a little too tight and her white vest top was much too thin. If her intention was to drive him to distraction, she was succeeding. With great effort, the Doctor forced himself to look at her face and waited for her excitement about the event. But, Rose didn’t look particularly excited, she looked confused.

“It sounds… interesting.”

“Interesting? Rose, this festival is renowned by billions. You turn your nose up at it, and you’ll be insulting the entire Klophoy galaxy.”

With a shrug, she slipped down from the jumpseat and took his hand.

“If you say so, wouldn’t want to insult an entire galaxy, would we?”

The Doctor ushered Rose through the door, then followed behind, but bumped into her after two steps. When he looked up to see why she’d stopped, he immediately regretted his choice of event.

The Kookol music festival was very much like Woodstock, but there were a few key differences: there were more people, there were fewer clothes and there was a _lot_ more free love.

While the Doctor stood rooted in place, Rose walked forward with her mouth hanging open into a scene that would have made Caligula blush. After only a half dozen steps, an attractive young man and woman approached her, with much more than a casual interest in their eyes. Before they had gotten past ‘hello,’ the Doctor caught up with Rose and grabbed her wrist.

“On second thought, maybe we should try Samul III instead, they’ve got… I’m not sure what they’ve got, but I’m sure there’s _something_ there.”

Though the Doctor was tugging on her wrist insistently, Rose didn’t move. Instead, she looked over her shoulder and fluttered her lashes at him, grinning broadly. When her tongue made an appearance between her teeth, his eyes dropped to it and his rationality began to ebb.

“I dunno, Doctor, looks like kinda fun.”

All rational thought disappeared.

The Doctor had just started trying to work out whether she was serious when an alarm sounded from inside the TARDIS and jerked him out of the ( _completely inappropriate)_ thoughts he’d begun entertaining. With a glance over his shoulder, he yanked on her wrist and pulled a laughing Rose back through the TARDIS doors.

“But, Doctor, you said it would insult the entire galaxy if we didn’t go to the festival!”

“You ask me, galaxy could do with a few more insults, Klophoy always was bit smug. Besides, this looks more important than Sodom and Gomorrah out there.”

Still laughing loudly, Rose dropped into the jumpseat, while the Doctor input the coordinates to follow the signal. If it hadn’t been for Rose’s presence, and comments, he wouldn’t have been at all bothered by the festival. As it was, his face felt hot while of the rest of the blood in his body had traveled much further south. As the TARDIS hurled itself way through the vortex, he kept reminding himself that he did _not_ want to turn around and go back.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

The TARDIS landed in a darkened room and the Doctor stepped out, looking around warily. The signal was coming from here somewhere and not knowing where made him nervous. Rose, of course, wasn’t worried at all, and just followed him out, with her usual trusting curiosity.

“So, what is it? What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know. Some kind of signal, drawing the TARDIS off course.”

As soon as the lights came on, the Doctor realized where they were: a museum dedicated to pieces of the outside universe.

“Someone’s got a hobby… chunks of meteorite, moondust, the milometer from the Roswell spaceship. Oh, look at you! The stuff of nightmares, reduced to an exhibit.”

The Doctor looked at the lifeless Cyberman, through glass that reflected back the eyes of The Last Time Lord. Memories of enemies from the past flooded through him and he wondered, not for the first time, whether he had outlived his own usefulness.

“I’m getting old…”

*

It wasn’t long before they found themselves in the office of one Mr. Henry Van Statten. The office was dominated by a very large, very ugly portrait of the man himself, which was making it very difficult for the Doctor to take him seriously.

“We’re hidden away with the most valuable collection of extraterrestrial artifacts in the world, and you just stumbled in by mistake.”

“Pretty much sums me up, yeah.”

“Question is, how did you get in, 53 floors down, with your little cat-burglar accomplice? Quite a collector yourself, she’s rather pretty.”

“She’s gonna smack you if you keep calling her ‘she.’”

Rose’s cheek made the Doctor grin, and he made no attempt to cover it. But, his smile quickly faded when his attention was drawn to the pretty boy standing behind Van Statten's desk.

“She’s English, too! Hey, little Lord Fauntleroy, got you a girlfriend.”

Hackles raised, the Doctor returned his attention to Van Statten. Anyone this pompous would feel the need to show off when provoked, and the Doctor needed information, so he decided to bait Van Statten. This regeneration was proving to be very antagonistic, and the dismissive comments about Rose had irked him, so he was going to enjoy it.

“So you’re just about an expert in everything, except the things in your museum. Anything you don’t understand, you lock up.”

“And you claim greater knowledge?”

“I don’t have to make claims, I know how good I am.”

“And yet I captured you, right next to the Cage. What were you doing down there?”

“You tell me.”

“The Cage contains my one living specimen.”

“And what’s that?”

“Like you don’t know.”

“Show me.”

“You wanna see it?”

“Blimey, you can smell the testosterone.”

Rose disrupted the hostility, but the two men never broke eye contact. After being confronted with so many reminders of his past, the Doctor was feeling predatory, and Van Statten was obviously threatened. Without looking away from the Doctor, Van Statten continued his display of self-importance.

“Goddard! Inform the Cage we’re heading down. You, English, look after the girl. Go and canoodle or spoon or whatever it is you British do.”

If Van Statten had been trying to pique the Doctor, he couldn't have chosen a better way. Adam had hardly said anything, but the Doctor already disliked the pretty boy almost as much as he did the ugly man. The thought of leaving Rose with Adam unsettled the Doctor, but he needed to find out what Van Statten was hiding, and that overpowered everything else.

After a few moments of debate, the Doctor decided that if Rose could take on a Slitheen, she could manage this boy. In many ways, a Slitheen would be preferable, at least then he could be sure she would _want_ to fight it off.

*

“I’ve come to help. I’m the Doctor.”

“Doc-tor? _The_ Doc-tor?

The Time War was supposed to be over. He’d killed them all, killed _everyone_ to end it, but here it was… and Van Statten had locked him in with it. Panic, like he hadn’t felt since the Moment, overtook him, and the Doctor pounded at the door, screaming to be let out.

But, the door didn’t open.

And, the threatened shots never fired.

“Powerless, fantastic! If you can’t kill, then what are you good for, Dalek? What the hell are you here for?

“I am a soldier, I was bred to receive orders.”

“They’re never gonna come. Your race is dead. You all burnt. All of you. Ten million ships on fire. The entire Dalek race wiped out, in one second.”

The softness that had been returning to his soul since he met Rose began to harden again. Torturing this Dalek with the knowledge of its defeat was too delicious, and he was euphoric with it.

“You lie!”

“I watched it happen. I _made_ it happen!”

“You destroyed us?”

Staring into the eye of his enemy, the resentment and self-loathing his action had bred were reawakened.

“I had no choice.”

“And what of the Time Lords?”

“Dead. They burnt with you. The end of the Last Great Time War. Everyone lost.”

“I am alone in the universe. So are you. We are the same.”

Anger and revulsion filled him at the accusation. He was _nothing_ like the Daleks.

“We’re not the same! I’m not…”

But, the objection died out on his tongue. All the Daleks knew was killing, and that was what was needed here.

“No, wait. Maybe we are. You’re right! Yeah, okay. You’ve got a point. ‘Cause I know what to do. I know what should happen. I know what you deserve. Exterminate.”

The others were gone, and there was no one left to punish, but the need to punish was still there. Now he had a target. A defenseless target that couldn’t fight back, couldn’t stop him from venting his rage.

“Have pity!”

“Why should I? You never did.”

Every thought in the Doctor's mind was replaced with fury and hatred. In the end, he had to be torn away from the controls, thrashing and screaming for the Dalek's death.

*

In ending the Time War, the Doctor had paid the ultimate price, but this Dalek had survived. Even as he begged to be released so he could save the Earth, the destruction of his final enemy consumed him. It had to end, once and for all.

Nothing and no one else mattered.

When the alarm sounded, Rose's face appeared and he suddenly remembered that there were other things he should care about. By killing the Dalek, he was saving her, and everyone else on the planet, but he wondered if that really mattered. If its death cost their lives, cost _her_ life, would he hesitate to kill it anyway?

*

“We’ve got to keep that thing alive. We could just seal the entire vault, trap it down there.”

“Leaving everyone trapped with it? Rose is down there. I won’t let that happen, have you got that?”

If it came to it, he might risk other lives to kill the Dalek, but he wouldn’t risk Rose. He was sure he wouldn’t risk Rose. But, Van Statten was happy to kill everyone else on the base to keep it alive. The man was repulsive.

*

“I fed off the DNA of Rose Tyler. Now, I shall follow the Primary Order, the Dalek instinct to destroy, to conquer!”

For this Dalek to even mention Rose’s name infuriated him, and now it was saying it had absorbed a part of her. It was too much. The Doctor’s thin veneer of control cracked.

“The Daleks have failed! Why don’t you finish the job and make the Daleks extinct? Rid the universe of your filth! Why don’t you just die?!”

“You would make a good Dalek.”

It was the threat of its escape that spurred his order, not his outrage at its second accusation of similarity.

_Wasn’t it?_

“Seal the vault.”

“Doctor, she’s still down there.”

The question of whether he would risk her life to kill the Dalek was answered. He would. Even as he worked to seal her in, he had to give her the chance, he had to warn her to get out. Rose meant so much to him, he wanted her to live, but he _needed_ the Dalek to die.

“You’ve got to keep moving. The vault is being sealed off up at level 46.”

“Can’t you stop them closing it?”

“I’m the one who’s closing it. I can’t wait, and I can’t help you. Now for God’s sake, run!”

The power was up, they could close the bulkhead, but she wasn’t there yet. The Dalek was getting closer to escaping and surviving, and it had to be stopped. But she wasn’t there yet. The feelings that had been growing in him clamored to be heard, he cared so much for her.

But he hated the Daleks more.

“I’m sorry.”

She could still make it. If there was anything he knew about Rose Tyler it was that she could survive. She could still make it.

“The vault is sealed.”

“Rose! Where are you? Did you make it?”

“Sorry, I was a bit slow… Doctor, it wasn’t your fault. Remember that, okay? It wasn’t your fault. And d’ya know what? I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.”

“Exterminate!”

His hearts seized.

As soon as the shot was fired, he knew that, once again, he had made the wrong choice. The Dalek’s death wasn’t worth Rose’s life, but he’d realized it too late. Now, he didn’t think he could ever recover. How could he when he’d killed the only thing that ever had a chance of healing him?

“I’m sorry…”

Her death was Van Statten’s fault at least as much as his own. The Doctor's punishment would come later, for now, he vented his rage at Van Statten.

“I said I’d protect her. She was only here because of me, and you’re sorry? I could have killed that Dalek in its cell, but you stopped me.”

“It was the prize of my collection!”

“Your collection? Well, was it worth it? Worth all those men's deaths? Worth _Rose_?”

The smallness of the man before him finally struck him, and he realized Van Statten didn’t matter.

“You took her down with you. She was 19 years old.”

The words were for himself. Van Statten didn’t matter.

*

“Open the bulkhead or Rose Tyler dies.”

“You’re alive!”

Rose was alive. The Doctor's hearts beat double time and wild emotion coursed through him. Rose was alive. A million thoughts tumbled through his mind all at once, and every one of them meant the same thing: Rose was alive.

“Open the bulkhead.”

The Dalek’s voice reminded him of its presence and the war reignited within him between his hatred of the Daleks and his feelings for Rose.

“What use are emotions if you can not save the woman you love?”

_Love._

How had a creature that reviled emotions seen what he, himself, had been unable to? It didn’t matter if the Dalek lived or died, Rose’s life was all that mattered. The war was won before it truly began.

“I killed her once, I can’t do it again.”

*

The gun was old and heavy, but it would work, it was powerful enough for one Dalek.

“Rose, get out of the way, now!”

“No! ‘Cause I won’t let you do this.”

“That thing killed hundreds of people.”

“It’s not the one pointing a gun at me.”

The Daleks took everything, time and again. He defeated them, but they kept coming back, kept taking more. There was only one thing left, there was only Rose. Now, the last of them was in front of him, _right next to her_ , and he had to kill it before it took her, too.

“I’ve got to do this, I’ve got to end it. The Daleks destroyed my home, my people. I’ve got nothing left.”

“Look at it.”

For the first time, the Doctor did look at the Dalek, really _looked_ at it. The casing was open, revealing the mass of twisted flesh inside with its tentacles held out in front of it. He had never seen a Dalek like that, open and vulnerable… and in front of a human.

“What’s it doing?”

“It’s the sunlight. That’s all it wants.”

“But, it can’t…”

Daleks didn’t care about sunlight, Daleks cared about killing. But, here was this Dalek, open of its own free will, with its tentacles held out to the sunlight. Somehow, Rose had changed one of the most evil beings in creation into something new, something that craved sunlight, and refused to kill.

_How had she done that?_

“It couldn’t kill Van Statten, it couldn’t kill me. It’s changing. What about you, Doctor? What the hell are you changing into?”

“I couldn’t…”

_…stop them._

“I wasn’t…”

_…enough._

“Oh, Rose, they’re all dead.”

“Why do we survive?”

That was the question the Doctor had asked himself every moment of every day since the end of the Time War… until he met Rose. Since he met her, the question hadn’t been on his mind as much. Since he met her, he had begun to see reasons to keep surviving. Rose had changed him as much as she had changed the Dalek.

“I don’t know.”

“I am the last of the Daleks.”

The Dalek sounded as lost and alone as he was. Pity was something he never thought he’d feel for a Dalek, but he pitied this one. Maybe it deserved pity more than any other creature in the universe. What had she done?

“You’re not even that. Rose did more than regenerate you. You’ve absorbed her DNA. You’re mutating.”

“Into what?”

“Something new. I’m sorry.”

“But, isn’t that better?”

This was something Rose couldn’t understand. All she knew of Daleks was what she had seen here, this Dalek. This pathetic creature that couldn’t do the only thing it knew how to do.

“Not for a Dalek.”

“I can feel so many ideas. So much darkness. Rose, give orders. Order me to die.”

This time, it was the Doctor who didn't understand. The Dalek was in despair, so much so that it wanted to die. This _wasn’t_ a Dalek anymore.

But Rose… this creature was asking Rose to do the same thing he had been forced to do. It was just one Dalek, but it was the last, and if she did this, she would be wiping out a species, too. The Doctor wanted to do something, to stop her, to tell her what she would be doing, but he couldn’t. Instead, he stood rooted in place, watching a scene he couldn’t even begin to understand.

“I can’t do that.”

“This is not life. This is sickness. I shall not be like you! Order my destruction. Obey. Obey! Obey!”

“Do it.”

“Are you frightened, Rose Tyler?”

“Yeah.”

“So am I. Exterminate.”

The Doctor watched, dumbfounded, as the Dalek destroyed itself.

What had Rose done? He knew she was changing him, she had been from the moment he first took her hand. The hollowed out, broken soldier was turning back into a man of flesh, and blood, and feeling. But, she'd changed something as broken as a Dalek into something that recognized its own capacity for evil. It should have been impossible.  

Maybe falling in love with Rose Tyler wasn’t as astonishing as he had thought. Maybe, it was just inevitable.

*

It was over. It was done.

Standing in front of the TARDIS, his last bit of home, the Doctor felt the end of War all over again. With the Dalek gone, he felt more alone than ever.

“Is that the end of it? The Time War.”

“I’m the only one left. I win. How ‘bout that?”

“The Dalek survived. Maybe some of your people did too.”

“I’d know, in here. Feels like there’s no one.”

“Well, then. Good thing I’m not going anywhere.”

“Yeah.”

She wasn’t going anywhere. The Time War was over and everyone was dead, friend and foe alike. But, this time, the Doctor wasn't alone. This time, Rose Tyler was there, and she wasn’t going anywhere.

“We’d better get out. Van Statten’s disappeared. They’re closing down the base. Goddard says they’re gonna fill it full of cement like it never existed. I’ll have to go back home.”

Just because the Doctor mislabeled his emotions, wasn't proof they didn't exist. The disdain he felt for Adam was as mislabeled as his feelings for Rose has been. But, the emotion existed, nonetheless.

“Better hurry up, then. Next flight to Heathrow leaves at 1500 hours.”

“Adam was saying that all his life, he wanted to see the stars.”

“Tell him to go and stand outside, then.”

“He’s all on his own, Doctor, and he did help.”

“He left you down there!”

“So did you.”

There was no way the Doctor could refute Rose's statement, but he still didn't want to bring Adam aboard. Casting about for another reason to deny her request, he seized on what annoyed him bout the boy.

“Plus, he’s a bit pretty.”

“I hadn’t noticed.”

The Doctor knew he couldn’t refuse Rose anything she wanted, even if it meant breaking his own hearts. Now that a name has been put to what he felt, he wasn’t sure whether he wanted to be alone with her, or run from her. One thing he knew for certain, however, was that he _didn’t_ want Adam around. But, if she wanted Adam, he would give her Adam.

He would always give Rose Tyler whatever her heart desired.

“On your own head.”

Maybe it was better if he wasn't alone with her.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

“This is the TARDIS. Yes, it’s bigger on the inside. It travels in time and space. Yes, it’s the most amazing thing you’ve ever seen. Don’t touch anything. Rose, find him a room, somewhere.”

The Doctor didn’t look at Rose or Adam, but went straight to the console and began setting the controls to send the TARDIS into the vortex.

A loud thunk echoed through the room as Adam hit the floor in a dead faint. With a panicked cry, Rose ran over and crouched at his side, but the Doctor just rolled his eyes and continued on with the controls. Rose could deal with the new idiot, he had better things to do.

“Adam… Adam, are you okay?”

After a few pats on the cheek and concerned encouragements from Rose, the pretty boy finally opened his eyes. With a grin, Rose stood and helped him to his feet. With a surreptitious glance in their direction, the Doctor saw that her tongue stayed firmly behind her teeth. At least it wasn’t his grin.

 _No, not_ my _grin. There is nothing about Rose that is_ mine _, and there never will be._

Even though he knew it was true, the thought made him angry and his voice came out harder than he intended it to be.

“I said get him to a room, before he passes out again, or throws up on my floor.”

While she helped Adam to his feet, Rose looked over at the Doctor, startled.

“Alright, don't have a go at me, I'm doing it.”

“I’m not having a go, I just don’t want to clean up after him. Now, get him to a room!”

Rose’s eyebrows shot up and Adam stepped back, both startled by the Doctor's shout. Even though there was nothing else that needed to be done, the Doctor kept flipping levers and turning dials, with his eyes locked on the controls.

In silence, Rose led Adam to the door, watching the Doctor silently with a concerned frown. When they reached the door, she opened her mouth to say something, but he moved around the console so his back was to her.

They stayed quiet until they thought they were out of earshot.

“Is he always that much of an arse?”

If Rose answered Adam’s whispered question, the Doctor didn’t hear it.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*


	6. The Long Game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor takes Rose and Adam to Satellite Five. Adam quickly proves he’s out for himself and his interference may have disastrous consequences for more than just the history of the human race.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

_Hell was not a pit of fire and brimstone_

_Hell was waking up alone_

_The sheets wet with your tears and your seed_

_Knowing the woman you had dreamed of_

_Would never come back to you._

 

 _Seduce me at Sunrise_ ~ Lisa Kleypas

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

After the random explosions from under the console had burned him for the fifth time, the Doctor decided to give up working for the time being and headed to his room. When he came to his door and opened it, however, it wasn’t his room. He was at the swimming pool, and Rose was swimming, by herself. Before she noticed him, he turned and left, pulling the door quietly shut behind him.

Retracing his steps, he made his way back to the console room. There had been some strange purple smoke accompanying the last explosion, and he wondered if something in it might have scrambled his sense of direction.

Once again, the Doctor made his way to his room, paying careful attention to each turn. When he opened the door he was sure was his, he found himself looking at the swimming pool, again. Thankfully, Rose didn't notice him, so he closed the door and started back toward the console room, muttering under his breath.

After walking for much longer than it should have taken, the Doctor found himself facing a dead end. With a growl, he scolded his ship.

“I don’t know what you’re up to, but you can stop it right now, you meddlesome piece of junk.”

The hallway went black.

In complete darkness, the Doctor continued to insult his magnificent machine as he felt his way along the wall. When he finally came to a door, he grumbled toward the ceiling.

“This’d better not be the swimming pool.”

Quietly, he opened the door and looked in; Rose was at the far end of the pool with her back to him. He closed the door as quietly as he had opened it.

With his voice low enough that it couldn’t be heard through the door, the Doctor snarled at the ceiling.

“It's not going to work, so just stop it!. She’s going swimming with that pretty boy she brought aboard and doesn’t want me there.”

Like an angry lion, the Doctor stalked down the hall, until he came to a door that was identical to his in every way. As he reached for the handle, he threatened the ceiling in a voice that would have made entire armies turn and run.

“This had better be the right room, or so help me, I will disconnect your access to every television station in the universe. You’ll never see another Xarrotson soap opera, again.”

It was the pool.

Even though he had only opened the door enough to peek through, Rose saw him and called out, happily.

“Doctor! Did you come to swim with me? Where’s your swimsuit?”

_Dammit._

Taking a deep breath, the Doctor pulled the door open and stepped into the room, noting that it had changed significantly since the last time he’d been there. Before it had resembled a natural pool one might find carved into a cave but now, it looked as if it had been pulled straight out of a ski resort. The walls and ceiling were made of lucent glass and the pool was surrounded by lounge chairs, small tables, and potted plants. Through the crystal walls, snow-capped mountains were visible in the far distance, and the untouched drifts just outside sparkled in the sunshine. The bright light reflected off the snow made the water glitter and glisten, and the white floors and columns practically glowed.

After taking a few steps into the room, the Doctor stopped and crossed his arms over his chest. He was mentally working out which circuits he would need to disconnect to remove the TARDIS’ soap opera privileges, and barely looking at Rose.

“I’m not swimming, I just wanted to make sure you’d found the pool alright. Where’s Adam?”

When Rose got out of the water and started walking toward him, the Doctor’s full attention snapped to her and his arms and jaw dropped. She was in a bikini. As much as he wanted to run, he couldn’t make his legs obey, so he just stared as she approached him.

_Shit. Shit. Shit._

“I dunno. Took him to a room, like you asked, and haven’t seen him since.”

The reminder of his earlier behavior made the Doctor grimace slightly, but as his eyes slid down Rose’s body, his thoughts skidded to a halt. In Cardiff, her corset had made his breath catch, and he’d been thinking about it ever since. This bikini, however, was making him forget how to breathe entirely, and he knew he would never think of anything else again.

The deep blue cups pushed her breasts up perfectly, putting a significant amount of cleavage on display, and taffy pink bows were placed strategically at her neck and hips. The Doctor ached to untie those bows, reveal the rest of her golden skin and finally give in to his desires. A vision of lowering her onto one of the lounge chairs and holding her beneath him while he caressed every inch of her bare skin overwhelmed him, and he barely managed stifled a groan. If she dropped her gaze, she would easily be able to tell where his thoughts had gone; just the look on his face was probably enough to give him away.

Even though the Doctor was staring at her body openly, Rose never said a word.

It was a long time before he realized what he was doing, and managed to drag his gaze back up to her face. Rose was watching him through lowered lashes, her cheeks a bright shade of pink, and their eyes met for a just a moment before they both looked away. The Doctor expected another version of the Tyler slap, followed by a demand to be taken home. Instead, he was met with a soft, trembling voice.

“Do… do you wanna come swimming with me, Doctor?”

His head swiveled back to her and their eyes met again. Her cheeks were bright red now, and she bit her bottom lip so hard it turned white but kept her eyes on his. Joining her was the one thing he wanted most in the universe, in all of time and space. He loved just spending time with her and spending time with her while she was in that bikini… but, if he spent time with her while she was in that bikini, something would happen that would result in her demanding to be taken home, and he couldn’t bear to lose her.

Slowly and deliberately, he took a step back and shook his head.

“Got stuff I should be doing, ‘sides, never been much for swimming, me.”

The pretty boy suddenly returned to his thoughts, and the Doctor turned to frown at the door as if he expected Adam to walk through it at any moment.

“I’m sure Adam will be here to keep you company soon.”

Rose shrugged and looked at the door as well. The action drew the Doctor’s attention back to her and his eyes slid down her body again. With great effort, he pulled his gaze back up to her face and made himself pay attention to her words when she spoke.

“I dunno, I told him the TARDIS would show him how to get to the pool, but it’s been over an hour and he hasn’t shown up. Guess he decided not to come. Stay with me, please Doctor? You don’t have to come in the water if you don’t want to.”

The hopeful look in her eyes made him reconsider his decision, but only for a moment. Just because Adam had decided not to come, didn’t mean the Doctor could stay, and he knew it. Using it as an opportunity to pull his jacket closed, and cover himself as much as possible, he crossed his arms again and shook his head. Whether to remind her or himself, he resolutely repeated his excuse for leaving.

“Got things I need to do. Since the Horsehead Nebula, the Baratian collimator’s been acting up and the viewscreen hasn’t been working right. I need to get it fixed, or we’re gonna end up walking out onto a battlefield or summat.”

Rose’s disappointed look, and the droop of her shoulders, once again tempted him to stay. But, when his eyes drifted downward, and there was an accompanying twitch in his jeans, he knew he needed to leave. Now.

“You have fun.”

Just before the door closed after him, he heard a decidedly dejected voice trailing after him.

“Yeah… thanks…”

*

This time, the TARDIS let him go to his room without any detours. As soon as the door closed behind him, he turned and banged his forehead against it a few times. This was becoming a very common practice. Ritual punishment complete, he turned and walked further into the room, but stopped short when he saw what was on the bed.

A pair of black swim trunks edged in blue were laid out carefully, with a dark blue towel folded beside them. The blue was the same as Rose’s bikini and, he realized, it was also the exact shade as the TARDIS. The Doctor shook his head and muttered toward the suit.

“No.”

Annoyed at the TARDIS’ latest meddling, the Doctor moved to his work table with the image of Rose in her bikini spinning in his mind. While he sat and adjusted himself uncomfortably, he groused toward the table,

“Suppose the cold water disappearing is you too. Don’t suppose you’d like to tell me why?”

The vibration under his feet felt decidedly like someone blowing a raspberry. He spun his chair around, intending to yell at the ceiling, but stopped when he saw the bed.

The black and blue swimsuit had been replaced with a longer, solid black one and a black T-shirt.

Deciding that the best course of action would be to ignore the machinations of his timeship, the Doctor turned back to the table and picked up the nearest item. His jaw clenched when he saw that he’d picked up a broken water tap with a black ‘C’ stamped on the white handle.

The shattered mirror was worth the satisfaction throwing the tap across the room had given him.

After staring at the pile of splintered glass for a few minutes, he decided it was best he clean it up now, before he ended up stepping in it when he had his boots off. He tipped the gleaming shards into the rubbish bin and turned back toward his work table, only to find a new change of clothing on his chair.

A blue and white men’s, union suit style swimming costume, circa 1890, was laid out across the back of the chair with an ancient looking white towel folded on the seat.

The Doctor’s knuckles turned white and the muscles in his jaw twitched from how tightly he clenched both, but he managed to resist throwing anything else. Instead, he growled under his breath and turned to leave the room.

“Right, no soap operas, and no reggae music.”

When he passed the bed, there was a red speedos swimsuit lying on it.

“…and _no_ maqrezingtl.”

*

Hours later, Rose entered the console room. The Doctor was unsure exactly how long it had been, as he had been too absorbed in disconnecting various circuits on the TARDIS’ personal entertainment systems to care.

“Good morning, Doctor. Did you sleep well?”

“No. Don’t need much sleep, me, got better things to do.”

The grating on the floor creaked as the Doctor started to slide out from under the console. Before he made it all the way out, sparks flew, and the latest in a long succession of explosions caught his hand. Shoving his burnt finger into his mouth, he directed a muffled yell toward the console.

“Burn me all you like, you brought this on yourself!”

More sparks sprayed, accompanied by a decidedly angry sounding metallic squealing. Rose jumped back from the sparks, narrowly missing being burned herself.

“Blimey! What’d you do to the TARDIS?”

“What did _I_ do? _She’s_ the one that…”

The Doctor stopped mid-sentence and dropped the accusing finger he’d been pointing at the column when he realized how this must look to Rose. Pulling his other finger from his mouth, he tapped the console a few times to make sure he wasn’t going to be electrocuted before checking the controls. He glowered at the console and tried to sound like he wasn’t upset.

“So, where’s Adam? You two have fun last night?”

“Dunno, I haven’t seen him since I dropped him off at his room. He never came to the pool and I didn’t stay very long after you left. It’s no fun swimming by yourself.”

A happy warmth spread through the Doctor, and he couldn’t help grinning at Rose while she dropped onto the jumpseat. His grin faded when he saw how disappointed she looked, however, and he immediately felt bad for having left her alone.

“I’m sorry, he must have been tired, it was a long day at Van Statten’s.”

Rose began to say something but was cut off by a loud voice coming down the hall.

“Do you know how long I’ve been trying to find this place? You should put maps on the wall or something, I’ve been looking for hours! I gotta say, no offense, but your ship’s a bit rubbish. I’ve never slept in a room that small, and I haven’t slept in a hammock since I was a kid. Oh, and you’d think with technology this advanced you could put in a bloody toilet. I’ve never even seen a chamber pot before, never mind _used_ one! But, I don’t know, maybe you do have toilets, it’s not like I could go looking. I don’t know if you thought I’d try to steal something or that I’d get lost, but I’m pretty sure locking people in their rooms all night is against some kind of code. Don’t you have health and safety inspections ‘round here?”

Rose and the Doctor stared at Adam. Even after his tirade stopped, Rose remained speechless with her mouth hanging open, but the Doctor had to turn around to keep from laughing in the boy’s face halfway through. With a gentle pat on the console, he mentally thanked the TARDIS and promised to reconnect the circuits to the maqrezingtl dispenser.

“Sorry ‘bout that. We’re a bit short on space, you got the best room the TARDIS could give you. Thanks for letting me know about the locks, probably just need to be recalibrated.”

The Doctor moved around to the other side of the console, ignoring the startled look Rose was now giving him. He didn’t want either of them to see the grin on his face, but he couldn’t keep from chuckling.

“So, where should we go next, Rose?”

“I dunno. Where do you wanna go, Adam?”

The grin and the chuckle both disappeared.

“I dunno, what are my options?”

“I’ve told you, it’s a time and space machine. You can go anywhere in time and space. Blimey.”

The Doctor continued to mutter under his breath while Rose tried to explain to Adam that he could go anywhere and anywhen that he wanted. In the end, the best he could come up with was that he wanted to go to the future, so the Doctor decided on someplace nice and safe: the Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire.

As soon as the TARDIS was moving again, Adam turned green and had to sit on the jumpseat, with his head between his knees. Rose sat beside him, rubbing his back comfortingly, and shaking her head at the Doctor, who was grinning broadly and trying not to laugh. He considered purposely making the landing rough but decided that the amount of work involved in cleaning up the pretty boy’s sick wasn’t worth the entertainment value. But it was a _very_ close decision.

Once they’d landed, the Doctor made for the door immediately, but Adam continued to moan with his head in his lap. The Doctor folded his arms over his chest and leaned against the railing, looking impatiently at his watch.

“If you’re too sick to go, Rose and me can go. She can bring you back a souvenir if you like.”

“Doctor!”

Leaving Adam to whinge alone, Rose walked over to the Doctor and took his arm, leaning up to talk quietly in his ear. The Doctor couldn’t help but enjoy the familiar way she looped her arm through his and leaned against him to whisper.

“Maybe we’d better give him a minute to adjust. And, just explain to him where we are right at first, don’t let it take him by surprise, yeah?”

“I let things take you by surprise.”

“Yeah, but that’s me, Adam’s not good at…”

The Doctor smirked and Rose smacked him on the arm, trying not to laugh. When she started to step back, he slipped his arm around her waist and pulled her back to him to whisper in her ear. Again, she leaned against him, and he let himself enjoy the feel of her in his arms.

“Tell you what, how ‘bout I take you out, and tell you where we are, then you can explain it to him. Maybe he’ll take it better coming from you.”

Nodding, Rose called over her shoulder.

“Adam, hang on. Since the viewer is still broken, the Doctor and me will just check to make sure we’re where we’re supposed to be, then tell you when to come out.”

“Yeah, we’ll make sure there’s nothing too deadly out there.”

Before Rose could scold him for his teasing, the Doctor slipped out the door, grinning to himself when she skipped out after him.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

“So, it’s 200,000, it’s a spaceship… no, wait a minute, space station. And… go try that gate over there.”

While Rose poked her head back into the TARDIS and called for Adam to come out, the Doctor leaned against the side and grinned. He knew it wouldn’t be long before the pretty boy embarrassed himself again, and he was eager to see it.

With her attention elsewhere, the Doctor was free to watch Rose without her knowing. Even if she was doing it to impress someone else, he enjoyed watching the show she was putting on.

Once they were standing in front of the glass, looking over the Earth, the Doctor took the opportunity to impress Rose some more… and hopefully get Adam to embarrass himself, somehow.

“The Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire. And there it is. Planet Earth, at its height. Covered with megacities, five moons, population 96 billion, the hub of a galactic domain stretching across a million planets, a million species, with mankind right in the middle.”

As if on cue, Adam’s eyes rolled back and he dropped to the floor like a sack of Bura potatoes. The Doctor smirked.

“He’s your boyfriend.”

“Not anymore.”

The look of contempt on her face and the note of derision in her voice made the Doctor very, very happy.

*

“When you get in trouble, just don’t involve me.”

Cathica stormed down the hall, leaving the Doctor and Rose, standing side by side in the lift.

“That’s her gone, Adam’s given up, looks like it’s just you and me.”

“Yeah.”

“Good”

“Yep.”

Where they were going was certain to be extremely dangerous, but the Doctor couldn’t help the grin that spread across his face. When he took Rose’s hand and she grinned up at him, he’d never been happier.

The Doctor and Rose Tyler, together, _alone_ , as it should always be.

*

“That’s why you’re so dangerous. Knowledge is power, but you remain unknown. Who are you?”

With a click of the Editor’s fingers, electricity surged through the manacles, and the Doctor and Rose both cried out.

Above the pain surging through him, the Doctor heard Rose whimpering and daggers struck into his hearts. As soon as the power shut off, he scrambled to make her torture stop, giving the least amount of information he could to appease the man.

“Leave her alone! I’m the Doctor, she’s Rose Tyler. We’re nothing, we’re just wandering.”

“Tell me who you are!”

“I’ve just said!”

“Yeah, but who do you work for? Who sent you? Who knows about us? Who exactly…”

The Editor stopped short with an excited look as if remembering something sensational, and the Doctor grew nervous.

“Time Lord.”

“What?”

“Oh, yes! The last of the Time Lords, and his traveling machine with his little human girl from long ago.”

Fear gripped the Doctor as he tried to figure out where this sudden knowledge could have come from, but a cold, pale finger caressing Rose’s cheek pulled him out of his thoughts.  She flinched back as if struck and his anger flared. It was difficult to move in the manacles, but he did his best to place himself between them and pull the Editor’s attention back to himself.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Time travel.”

His blood turned as cold as the room around him and he searched desperately for a way to cover, but his words were feeble and unsteady.

“Someone’s been telling you lies.”

“Young master Adam Mitchell?”

With a click of the Editor’s fingers, an image of Adam appeared in front of them. He lay prostrate in a chair, with energy streaming from the open door in his head into the computer above him.

Another stupid ape. She’d found another stupid ape to bring along, and now he’d gone and put her, and everyone else in danger.

“Oh, my God, his head!”

“What the hell’s he done? What the hell’s he gone and done? They’re reading his mind, he’s telling them everything!”

“And through him, I know everything about you. Every piece of information in his head is now mine, and you have infinite knowledge, Doctor. The human empire is tiny compared to what you’ve seen in your T-A-R-D-I-S. TARDIS!”

Panic flooded through the Doctor at the servile little man’s words and he steeled his resolve. He would have done anything to stop this man from hurting Rose, but keeping the man’s master from getting ahold of the TARDIS was even more important.

“Well, you’ll never get your hands on it, I’ll die first.”

“Well, die all you like, I don’t need ya. I’ve got the key.”

In the image in front of them, the TARDIS key pulled itself out of Adam’s pocket by the chain and hung in midair beside him. Rose had given her key to the pretty boy.

Anger flooded through the Doctor, followed quickly by another emotion that he tried to ignore; her recklessness mattered more than anything he might feel about her weakness for pretty boys, right now. Try as he might, the Doctor couldn’t tamp down the emotions surging through him.

“You and your boyfriends!”

“Today, _we_ are the headlines. We can rewrite history. We can prevent mankind from ever developing.”

It had been against his better judgment that he’d brought Adam along, he’d only done it to please Rose. Now that bad decision was going to get them all killed and destroy the history of mankind.

_This is exactly why it’s such a bad idea to get so attached to anyone._

*

The Doctor sat with Cathica while everywhere around them, people were beginning to clean up the rubble. Behind him, Rose and Adam were waiting, but he didn’t want to think about either of them, yet.

“We’re just gonna go. I hate tidying up, too many questions. Human race should accelerate, now. All back to normal.”

“What about your friend?”

“He’s _not_ my friend.”

Unable to prolong his scant goodbye to Cathica any more, the Doctor got up and stalked toward Adam. He passed Rose without acknowledging her.

“Now don’t…”

“I’m all right now. Much better. And I’ve got the key. Look, it’s… It all worked out for the best, didn’t it? ”

Without a word, the Doctor grabbed Adam’s shoulder and dragged him into the TARDIS. He didn’t even spare a glance in Rose’s direction.

*

Once the door closed, the Doctor pushed Adam away and went directly to the console. An indignant cry accompanied the loud crash of a body colliding with the floor grating.

“You know, it’s not actually my fault, because _you_ were in charge! Rose?”

Ignoring the whining plea for sympathy from the boy sprawled on the floor, Rose crossed to the jumpseat with her eyes fixed on the Doctor. A heavy silence filled the room as the TARDIS hurled itself back to the 21st century, and before Adam had even pulled himself to his feet, they landed. The Doctor grabbed the boy by the scruff of the neck, and hauled him through the door, like a puppy about to be punished. Rose trailed in their wake, silently.

*

“It’s my house. I’m home. Oh, my God, I’m home!”

While Adam babbled as if he’d actually been away from home for 198,000 years, the Doctor watched, seething with fury. When the boy finally turned, he took a step back from the thunderous look that greeted him.

“Blimey. I thought you were gonna chuck me out of an airlock.”

Ever the optimist, the Doctor gave the worthless pretty boy one more chance to show whether he had any redeeming value whatsoever.

“Is there something else you wanna tell me?”

“No… what do you mean?”

He didn’t.

“The archive of Satellite Five. One second of that message could have changed the world.”

Ignoring the wordless protests from behind him, the Doctor held the sonic over the answerphone until it sparked and popped. When he finally turned back to Adam, the Doctor gave him a look of contempt before striding past. Again, he didn’t acknowledge Rose as he passed her.

“That’s it then. See ya.”

“How do you mean ‘see ya’?”

Every word out of Adam’s mouth was making the Doctor question his resolve against violence further. He needed to leave. Now.

“As in, goodbye.”

“What about me? You can’t just go, I’ve got my head. I’ve got a chip type two. My head opens."

While the Doctor chose to avoid physically attacking his enemies, he wasn’t above tormenting them. Now, he could see a perfect opportunity to inflict misery on an enemy and he couldn’t resist taking advantage of it.

“What, like this?”

With a click of his fingers, the door in Adam’s head whirred open and the boy glared.

“Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

Another click, another whir. Far from quelling the Doctor’s enmity, watching Adam get more upset was it was spurring him on.

“Stop it!”

With an evil grin, the Doctor raised his hand to click his fingers again but dropped it when Rose interrupted him.

“All right now, Doctor. That’s enough. Stop it.”

“Thank you.”

The Doctor stopped his assault but levelled Rose with a hard gaze before turning his murderous glare back on Adam. The amount of pleasure he had derived from provoking Adam should have embarrassed him, but it didn’t, he was just annoyed that he’d been forced to stop. Unable to bring himself to look at Rose while she studied the pretty boy in front of her, the Doctor kept his eyes locked on Adam with the proverbial killing look. No matter how much he tried to convince himself that his ire was entirely because of the potential damage to the timeline, he knew it wasn’t true.

Another click, another whir. This time it was Rose harassing the boy.

“Oi!”

“Sorry, couldn’t resist.”

Rose’s interference had disrupted the Doctor’s focus on torturing Adam, giving him the chance to remember why he was supposed to be angry in the first place. Now, he had calmed down just enough to avoid actually strangling the boy but still give him the dressing down he deserved.

“The whole of history could have changed because of you.”

“I’m sorry, and I’ve said I’m sorry. But you can’t just leave me like this!”

“Yes, I can. ‘Cause if you show that head of yours to anyone, they’ll dissect you in seconds.”

“But, I wanna come with you!”

“I only take the best. I’ve got Rose.”

The words had come without thought. He knew it was true, she was the only one he wanted to travel with, but he couldn’t make himself look at her.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

As soon as the doors shut behind Rose, the Doctor sent the TARDIS into the vortex with his eyes locked on the controls under his hands. He still couldn’t look at her. The silence grew heavier by the moment until Rose finally broke it.

“I’m sorry, Doctor.”

It took several deep breaths before the Doctor was able to calm himself enough to speak in a careful, measured tone.

“I’m not mad.”

“Yes you are, I can tell.”

The knuckles of his hand turned white as he clenched it around the nearest lever, which creaked under the pressure.

“Doctor… Please look at me?”

After closing his eyes and taking a few more deep breaths, the Doctor turned and looked at Rose, silently. She looked wretched, chewing on her bottom lip, and twisting her fingers around themselves as she gazed up at him. He wanted to be able to tell her he wasn’t mad. He wanted so much for the anger bubbling in him to disappear so they could go back to how it was before Adam and Satellite 5, but he couldn’t. The anger was real, it was vicious, and he couldn’t pretend that he wasn’t furious with himself for feeling the way he did.

“Look, I’m sorry I gave him the key, but I thought he was gonna be sick or something, not go and get a bloody door put in his head. I’m sorry I’m so stupid, and I’m sorry Adam nearly destroyed history, but I was with you when he did it, so how come you’re mad at me for it?”

By the end of her tirade, Rose’s voice had risen to a shout and, without thinking, the Doctor shouted in return.

“I’m not mad because he tried to destroy history, I’m mad because you had to go and bring him along in the first place!”

His teeth clicked when he snapped his mouth shut, but a string of curses fired through his mind, aimed at himself. Silence filled the air for one tense moment before being broken by a sob and the rattle of the floor grating as Rose ran from the room. The sound of crunching bones followed close behind when the Doctor’s fist made contact with the console, but it was quickly drowned out by his shout.

“FUCK!”

*

Several hours later, the Doctor was still pacing up and down the length of his room, rubbing the bandage on his hand absently. The pressure sent new waves of pain through his hand, but he relished the feeling. There was enough damage that he would need at least a week to recover unless he went into a healing trance. A trance was ridiculous for a broken hand, but he was going to have to do it if he didn’t want Rose to know how childish he was.

_One more reaction worthy of a human male._

The console room had gone dark shortly after Rose left, and the TARDIS had refused to turn the lights back on so he’d been forced to leave. Ever since, he’d been in his room, pacing up and down and trying to sort through what had just happened. What he had told Rose was true; he was mad that she had brought Adam along. Now he had to figure out why that upset him so much.

_Adam nearly destroyed history and potentially wiped out the human race._

That was true, but that happened around him on a regular basis, and it didn’t usually make him this mad.

_Adam told a dangerous alien about me and nearly cost me the TARDIS._

Again, that was true. Again, that happened frequently and didn’t usually cause this much anger.

_Rose brought someone else along who was not only out for himself but put her in danger._

Once again, that was true but, while it wasn’t a common occurrence, it still wasn’t really worthy of this level of anger.

_Rose brought a pretty boy along because she would rather be with him than with me._

Anger bubbled up again, and he clenched his damaged hand, sending fresh shock waves of pain up his arm. Try as he might, there was no way he could deny that it was Rose’s obvious preference for Adam that was making him mad.

It was only natural that Rose would be attracted to Adam. She was a beautiful, 19-year-old human female, and he was a 20 some-odd-year-old human male, who also happened to be rather pretty. He, on the other hand, was a 900-year-old Time Lord, who couldn’t win a Sontaran beauty pageant, and had more blood on his hands than she could possibly see in her lifetime. And, don’t forget that, while she had a very limited lifespan, he could live practically forever. What wasn’t there for a young girl to be attracted to?

In a fresh pique of anger, he lashed out and punched the high poster of his bed as he passed it. A string of curses in various languages was followed by the decision that a trance was definitely warranted if he wanted to retain the use of his right hand for the foreseeable future.

After settling himself into bed in preparation for the trance, the Doctor repeated over and over to himself that he wasn’t to fall asleep once he was healed. Maybe, if he said it enough times, his aberrant brain would do as it was told, for once.

_Sure, it will._

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

_Rose lay under him on a lounge chair by the pool, looking up at him quietly. He kissed his way down her neck to the bow between her breasts and tugged it open, followed by those at her hips. The blue material fell away._

_Her hands tightened on his shoulders as he pushed himself into her warm depths._

_He whispered in her ear._

_She remained silent._

_He moved in her, pleasure filling him._

_She lay under him, not resisting, but not encouraging._

_Golden light built in her._

_When he cried out, the light passed into him and burned him into nothingness._

_She left him to burn and ran to Adam._

_He watched from his own ashes as they embraced, then walked, arm in arm, into Van Statten’s bunker._

_The Dalek broke its chains and advanced on them._

_Adam pushed her toward it and ran to save himself._

_The Doctor raced through the halls of the bunker, searching for Rose. Every level, every room was filled with Daleks, murdering humans and Gallifreyans alike. Everyone fell before them, and he lost those he loved over and over._

_Again._

_His world burned, over and over._

_Again._

_He couldn’t save them, but he could save Rose._

_If he could find her._

_He found Adam, surrounded by Daleks. The boy sent the cold bodies of everyone from Satellite 5 toward the horde in an effort to save his own, pathetic life. Cathica, Suki and Henry Van Statten fell before the Daleks, but Adam was still overrun._

_To save himself, Adam joined Daleks and led them on a hunt for Rose. Everyone died in their path as they searched for her. The Dalek’s metallic voices taunted the Doctor._

_“You can not have the woman you love.”_

_“You can not have the woman you love.”_

_He had to find her._

_He had to save her from the Daleks._

_He had to save her from Adam._

_The doors of the bunker slammed shut._

_Rose and Adam laughed as they left him, trapped with the Daleks._

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

“No, Rose!”

The Doctor woke and was halfway to Rose’s room before he even realized he’d gotten out of bed. The moment realization hit, he knew he should stop, that he couldn’t go to her room like this, uninvited.

The rapid slapping of his bare feet on the floor never faltered.

When his gentle knock on her door got no answer, he called her name softly and opened the door. The room was dimly lit from a light shining under the door of the ensuite, and the only sound was that of her slow, steady breathing. The sound helped calm his thundering hearts, but not enough.

The Doctor crossed the room in three long strides, then stood beside Rose’s bed, looking down at her, silently. She looked so beautiful, with her hair splayed out on the pillow around her, and her features softened with sleep. One hand was curled in front of her face, and he slipped his hand into it as he sat on the edge of the bed. With their fingers wrapped around each other in the familiar embrace, he let out a sigh and his hearts finally returned to their normal rhythm.

After watching her quietly for a few moments, he raised his free hand to caress her cheek and run his fingers gently through her hair. She hadn’t worn the perfume from the bazaar again, but her scent had teased him in the weeks since. Now, it wafted up to him as her hair shifted under his hand, and the urge to lean in and inhale it more deeply seized him. Just as he began to lean down, her lashes fluttered. Quickly detangling his hand from her hair, he straightened back up and looked at the door. He knew he should leave, let go of her hand and leave the room before she ever knew he was there, but he couldn’t make himself move.

Rose’s eyes opened slowly, and her fingers flexed around his, but she didn’t jerk away or scream like the Doctor had expected her to. Instead, her fingers tightened around his, and she pulled his hand closer to her face until her lips brushed against his skin. The soft sigh that tickled the back of his hand took his breath away and sent a shudder through him.

In the low light, she turned her head and looked up at him. The room was too shadowed for her to be able to see much, but he could see her clearly as she gazed up at him. After studying his face for a few moments, she finally spoke.

“Doctor… what are you doing here?”

“I had a… I wanted to make sure you were alright.”

Mentally cursing himself, the Doctor closed his mouth, before he could say anything that would incriminate him further than his presence already did. She sat up slowly, never loosening her grip on his hand and continued her deep contemplation of his face. Unable to hold Rose’s intense gaze, the Doctor dropped his eyes and she immediately flexed her fingers around his again.

“I’m fine… you okay?”

Without a word, he nodded once, unsure whether she would be able to see the movement, but she seemed to feel it.

A shift in the air against his skin reminded the Doctor that he hadn’t put his jumper back on, and was now sitting on her bed, half dressed. At the sudden realization, his lowered eyes jumped back to hers, then slid down her body. The heavy duvet covered her below the waist, but above, she wore only a sheer lace camisole. Even in the low light, he could clearly see the lines of her body and the now familiar sensation of his body reacting, and his brain shutting down began. While he was letting his eyes wander over her, Rose whispered, in a barely audible voice.

“Doctor? In Van Statten’s bunker, what the Dalek said… what did it mean?”

His mind came back into sharp focus and his eyes slid away from her.

“What… It said a lot of things, Rose, you have to be more specific.”

“What it said about how you feel about me. It said you…”

Before Rose could finish the sentence, the Doctor had pulled his hand from hers and fled the room, leaving her alone in the dark.

*

As soon as he got back to his room, the Doctor turned around and hit the heavy wooden door. The newly healed knuckle cracked again. Bellowing in pain, he pulled the maimed hand against his chest and smeared blood across his skin, while searching his mind for new languages to curse himself in. Hopefully, another trance would fix it again, but it was going to wait until after he took a shower. He wanted to make himself feel the pain a while longer.

The room filled with steam as he ran a near boiling shower, and stripped down. After standing under the scalding water until his skin reddened, he held his hand into the stream and watched the sanguine streaks wash down the drain. He watched it for a long time, trying to ignore his still half-hard cock before coming to a realization: he was behaving like a human male because he was just as base and disgusting as they were. If he was going to behave like them in so many other ways, it was only fitting that he behave like them in all ways.

With his head pressed back against the wall, he finally took himself in hand. As he began to stroke himself with his injured hand, he let both pain and humiliation wash over him like the blistering water running down his back.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*


	7. Father's Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Having made an important decision, the Doctor takes Rose to meet her father. Everything goes wrong, and then the end of the world comes. Things said and done in the aftermath of the Reapers will make it impossible for anything to be the same between them again. The question is, will they want them to be?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay with this one, I had to spend some time in the hospital. But, I managed to take the time trapped in bed to think of a few things I want to do, so hopefully it will pay out in the end. In theory, the next chapter shouldn't take too long to get up, but given the season and the fact that I've somehow managed to take on a lot this year, I'm not making any guarantees!
> 
> Thanks to my awesome beta ScooterThyme and my local Britishisms expert, dancingonduckstreet
> 
> Hope you enjoy, and as always, I welcome any and all comments and love discussion. Just don't yell at me too much, I've never been any good at pretty crying ;P

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

_In dreams, there are hardly ever collisions_

_Even if there are, they don’t hurt_

_Reality is different_

_Reality bites_

 

 _The Sputnik Sweetheart ~_ Haruki Murakami

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

As usual, the Doctor was in the console room, but his usual energy was lacking, and he had remained unnaturally still for hours. He sat in the jumpseat with his feet up, tossing a ball back and forth. His right hand hadn’t healed completely the second time, and the sharp stabs the action sent up his arm served as punctuation to his dark thoughts. He relished each one.

Ever since Cardiff, he'd lusted after Rose; having what were practically wet dreams made that impossible to deny. However, when the Dalek announced that he was in love with her, he’d been forced to admit that his feelings were not just due to long dormant hormones. Accepting those two facts had been difficult, but ultimately a relief, and he’d hoped that acceptance would help him overcome the emotions. However, his jealousy of Adam, and subsequent behavior, had proven that it might not be as easy as he’d hoped. It was time for things to change.

It was time to take Rose home.

He was so engrossed in his thoughts, that he didn’t hear Rose's footsteps until her timid voice interrupted his brooding.

“Doctor…”

“Rose.”

He nodded without lifting his eyes. Even without looking at her, the Doctor could tell Rose was chewing her lip. There was a long silence before she finally took a deep breath and started talking.

“Doctor… My dad… my dad was the most wonderful man in the world. Mum would always sit on her bed, and show me pictures of him, and tell me all about him. How… how he was always having adventures, and would have wanted… well, he would have wanted to see me… and take me on adventures with him. That’s what Mum always says.

“So I was thinking… could we? Could we go and see my dad when he was still alive?”

Once again, Rose Tyler surprised him. He’d expected her to be angry, or hurt. He’d expected the slap he knew he deserved for sneaking into her room in the middle of the night. He hadn’t expected her to suddenly ask to go see her father.

“Where’s this come from all of a sudden?”

“All right, if we can’t, if it goes against the laws of time or something, then never mind, just leave it.”

“No, I can do anything, I’m just more worried about you.”

“I wanna see him.”

This was a bad idea. The Doctor had intended to take her home, but this wasn’t exactly what he’d had in mind. Taking her to see her father was just begging for trouble. But, Rose was asking for it, and had he learned through hard experience, that he would never be able to refuse Rose Tyler anything she asked for.

“Your wish is my command. But be careful what you wish for.”

It was ridiculous that he felt just like he had when she’d asked to bring Adam along. It was her father she was asking to see, not some pretty boy who’d turned her head, but there was something in the way she talked about him. Rose clearly idolized her father, and that made the Doctor very uneasy. Try as he did to convince himself that it was concern for her and not jealousy, he knew it was a lie.

*

Rose decided that she wanted to see her parent’s wedding, so the Doctor entered the coordinates for the time and place she gave him.

They stood in the back of the room, blending in with the small group, and watched the simple ceremony. Pete fumbled over Jackie’s name, and the Doctor rolled his eyes, doing his best to make sure Rose didn’t see.

“I thought he’d be taller…”

Rose’s disparagement of the man she’d put on a pedestal for so long, made the Doctor grin. He was able to save planets, entire galaxies with grace, and this man couldn’t even get his own wife’s name right. And, he was short to boot.

When he turned back to the ceremony, the Doctor felt a smug satisfaction that he couldn’t quite explain.

*

When they got back to the TARDIS, the Doctor went directly to the controls. It was time to do what he’d determined he was going to do, and take Rose home. But, before he could make himself speak, she has beside him.

“See… Dad died in a hit and run. Mum always says how he died alone, no one was there, and he was dead when the ambulance got there. And, she always says how she wished someone had been there for him when he died. I wanna be that someone, so he doesn’t die alone.”

The thought of taking her to see her dad’s death made him even more uneasy than her request to go to the wedding had. This time, it was from genuine concern for her; watching her father die would be devastating. But, she was asking…

He would take her just this one more place, then he would take her home.

*

They watched as her father’s car pulled up across the road, and he got out. The Doctor took her hand in his and held it tightly as the scene unfolded before them.

“Go to him, quick.”

Rose had stared down Slitheen and Daleks without batting an eyelash, but watching her father lying in the street had her frozen in place. She stared until the ambulance siren could be heard in the distance, then bolted around the corner, away from her father.

The Doctor found her leaning against the brick wall with tears streaming down her face.

“It’s too late now. By the time the ambulance got there, he was dead.”

Watching Rose cry, the Doctor cursed himself for doing this to her. It didn’t matter what she asked for, it was up to him to know better, and he’d known better than to give her this. It was cruel, and it was further evidence that it was dangerous to keep her with him, for both of them. Her desperate voice pulled him out of his thoughts.

“He can’t die on his own. Can I try again?”

Alarms sounded in his head. This was pushing it too far, there was no way he could justify bringing her here again. Having two of them in the same place, at the same time was asking for trouble in a way he hadn’t in a very long time. The consequences had nearly been disastrous then, and he knew this had the potential to be even worse. There were no other Time Lords to help contain the damage if things went wrong.

But Rose Tyler was asking…

*

“Right, that’s the first you and me. It’s a very bad idea, two sets of us being here at the same time. Just be careful they don’t see us. Wait till she runs off and he follows, then go to your dad.”

Watching another him holding another Rose’s hand, the alarms in his head were deafening. In 900 years, he had never wished for the protection of the other Time Lords so much as he did in this moment.

“I can’t do this.”

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. But, this is the last time we can be here.”

When the Doctor tried to take her hand again, she pulled away, and leaned against the wall, breathing heavily. Before he realized what was happening, Rose had pushed past the other set of themselves, and thrown herself against her father.

He was too furious to do anything but stare, while Rose stood in the street, laughing with Pete Tyler, who was still very much alive.

It had gone wrong.

*

Rose was babbling and the Doctor was fuming.

“When we met, I said ‘travel with me in space,’ you said ‘no.’ Then I said ‘time machine.’”

“It wasn’t some big plan, I just saw it happening and I thought ‘I can stop it.’”

“I did it again. I picked another stupid ape. I should have known. It’s not about showing you the universe, it never is. It’s about the universe doing something for you.”

The words were hurtful, and he knew it. He wanted to hurt her, to make her feel as badly as he was feeling. Her voice was evidence of the fact that he’d accomplished his goal, and it only made him angrier.

“So it’s okay when you go to other times, and you save people’s lives, but not when it’s me, saving my dad?”

“I know what I’m doing, you don’t! Two sets of us being there made that a vulnerable point.”

“But he’s alive! And, it’s not like I’ve changed history, not much. I mean, he’s never gonna be a world leader, he’s not gonna start World War III or anything.”

“Rose, there’s a man alive in the world who wasn’t alive before. An _ordinary_ man. That’s the most _important_ thing in creation. The whole world’s different because he’s alive!”

“What, would you rather him dead?”

“I’m not saying that!”

“No, I get it. For once, you’re not the most important man in my life.”

The words stung, because they were entirely too close to the truth. Again, he lashed out to hurt her, and cover his own feelings in the only way he knew how. He took away the most significant symbol of their relationship.

“Let’s see how you get on without me. Give me the key, the TARDIS key. If I’m so insignificant, give it me back.”

“All right then, I will.”

“You’ve got what you wanted, so that’s goodbye, then.”

“You don’t scare me! I know how sad you are. You’ll be back in a minute, or you’ll hang around outside the TARDIS waiting for me. And, I’ll make you wait a long time!”  

The door slammed behind him, and he stormed off down the stairs.

When he first entered the stairwell, he was tempted to hit the wall to make himself feel better, but he had enough presence of mind to realize that was a bad idea. Hitting a concrete wall with a hand that was only just recovering from the last round of abuse he’d subjected it to would probably have permanent consequences. Instead, he contented himself with storming down the street, clenching his fist over and over to send shockwaves of pain up his arm

When he threw the TARDIS doors open and found an empty shell, his hearts stopped.

“No… Rose!”

His hearts thundered back to life in double time, and he took off toward the church at top speed.

*

“There’s been an accident in time, a wound in time. They’re like bacteria, taking advantage.”

“What do you mean, time? What are you jabbering on about time?”

“I might have known you’d argue. I haven’t got time for this, now if you don’t mind, I’ve waited a long time to say this: Jackie Tyler, do as I say. Go and check the doors!”

“Yes, sir.”

“I should have done that ages ago.”

Jackie ran off, leaving the Doctor feeling very self satisfied, but it faded as he approached Rose, and towered above her. Her eyes were wide with fear. When he spoke, even though he addressed the room, his words were entirely for her. She was the only one who could truly understand his meaning, and he needed her to fully appreciate what she had done.

“Nothing in this universe can harm those things. Time’s been damaged, and they’ve come to sterilize the wound… by consuming everything inside.”

“Is this because… is this my fault?”

Even though he was terrified for her life, and he wanted to comfort her, he was still too furious to touch her. If she had only listened to him, if she hadn’t been so determined to save a man who was already dead, she wouldn’t be in danger now. Ignoring the contrition in her eyes, he levelled her with a flat look, and stormed past.

*

The Doctor looked out the window with Pete, watching the city dying in the distance.

“There’s smoke coming up from the city, but no sirens. I don’t think it’s just us, I think these things are all over the place. Maybe the whole world.”

A car came around the corner, then disappeared into nothingness, and it only took a moment for the Doctor to realize that it was the one that was meant to have killed Pete. There was a way to stop this, but it meant sacrificing the man Rose had jeopardized the entire world for. That would hurt her even more than his original absence had. As angry as he was with her, and as hurt as he was that she’d disregarded his warnings, he still couldn’t take her father away. Not now that she finally had him.

“Was that a car?”

“It’s not important. Don’t worry about it.”

*

“Can you save us?”

“Who are you two, then?”

“Stewart Hoskins.”

“Sarah Clark.”

It only took a moment for the Doctor to realize how obvious the answer to his question should have been. Dropping his eyes, he realized it was also obvious why they were getting married, and his tone softened.

“And one extra? Boy or girl?”

The bride caressed her belly, while her groom rubbed her back soothingly and they exchanged loving looks.

“I don’t know. I don’t want to know, really.”

“How did all this get started?”

“Outside the Beatbox club, 2:00 in the morning. Street corner.”

“I’d lost my purse, didn’t have money for a taxi.”

“I took her home.”

“Then what? Asked her for a date?”

Stewart ducked his head, and looked at the Doctor bashfully, while Sarah responded.

“Wrote his number on the back of my hand.”

“Never got rid of her since.”

“I don’t know what this is all about, and I know we’re not important…”

“Who said you’re not important? I’ve travelled to all sorts of places, done things you couldn’t even imagine, but you two… Street corner, 2:00 in the morning, getting a taxi home. I’ve never had a life like that. Yes, I’ll try and save you.”

They clung to each other, their eyes filled with tears of fear and pain. The future that should belong to their little family was being stolen away by the creatures screeching in the distance. The Doctor could never have the life they had, love, home, family, and he was more jealous of them than he had been of any two people in his lives. But, that future was theirs by rights, and he would do everything in his power to see that they kept what belonged to them.

*

“Now, Rose, you’re not going to bring about the end of the world, are you? _Are you_?”

The baby in front of him didn’t have Rose’s cinnamon eyes yet, but she was still Rose. This was probably his only opportunity to get her to sit still long enough to hear his instructions, and he wasn’t going to waste it, even if she was too young to understand or remember.

Footsteps approached, and he knew without looking they belonged to the grown-up Rose.

“Jackie gave her to me to look after. How times change.”

“I’d better be careful, I think I just imprinted on Mickey like a mother chicken.”

_Can’t even get away from the idiot clinging to her even when he’s only 5 years old._

The Doctor rolled his eyes. His annoyance distracted him, and he barely stopped Rose from reaching for the baby.

“No! Don’t touch the baby. You’re both the same person, that’s a paradox. We don’t want a paradox happening, not with those things outside. Anything new, any disturbance in time, makes them stronger. A paradox might let them in.”

“I can’t do anything right, can I?”

He was still smarting from her obvious preference for her father, and the reference to Mickey had made him that much more irritable. Despite the fact Rose was was obviously feeling bad already, he snapped at her.

“Since you asked, no. So, don’t. Touch. The baby.”

“I’m not stupid.”

“You could have fooled me!”

Her look of shock made him immediately regret his words.

Keeping his tongue in check was often difficult for him, and this go around, he seemed to have a decidedly marked tendency to insult people when he was upset. So far, he’d never stooped to levelling insults at Rose, but today, he just couldn’t seem to stop. Guilt stabbed him at the look on her face when she turned away, and he remembered why he didn’t go around insulting her. No matter what she’d done, he’d hurt her enough for one day.

“All right… I’m sorry…”

Hurt was still etched into her face when she turned back, and shame filled him. Apologizing for snapping wasn’t enough, he had an entire day to make amends for. He couldn’t say everything all at once, so he just said the most important thing.

“I wasn’t really gonna leave you on your own.”

“I know.”

She really did know him better than he knew himself, sometimes.

But, she didn’t know everything.

“Between you and me, I haven’t got a plan. No idea. No way out.”

“You’ll think of something.”

Normally, her faith in him was what got him through these situations, even though he knew he didn’t deserve it. After the way he been treating her today, he knew he was especially unworthy. For once, he decided to explain things to her completely, she deserved to understand exactly how the serious the situation was.

“The entire Earth’s been sterilised. This, and other places like it, are all that’s left of the human race. We might hold out for a while, but nothing can stop those creatures. They’ll get through in the end, the walls aren’t that old. And there’s nothing I can do to stop them. There used to be laws stopping this kind of thing from happening.  My people would have stopped this, but they’re all gone, and I’m going the same way.”

“If I’d realized…”

Suddenly, it struck him that he hadn’t explained it to her, not really. He’d just told her it was dangerous, but not exactly what was dangerous, or what she should or shouldn’t do. He hadn’t told her that saving her father would put everyone else at risk, he’d just expected her to do as he told her, no questions asked. Rose Tyler was not the sort to do anything, without being told why, and he knew it. It was one of the many things he loved about her.

“Just… tell me you’re sorry.”

“I am. I’m sorry.”

The trust that had been missing all day, was shining through her eyes again, and  his hearts swelled at the sight of it. His eyes dropped to her mouth, and he reached up to caress her cheek. When she pressed her cheek more firmly against his hand, and wrapped her fingers around his, he couldn’t stop himself from pulling her closer. At the last moment, he forced himself to pull her into a hug, and keep his hands, and lips, where they belonged.

They embraced tightly, but she suddenly pulled away from him. At first, he thought his hands had wandered without his realizing it, and he yanked them off of her. But, she continued to stare, and the notion that she had somehow read his mind, sent panic through him.

“Doctor… Have you got something…”

When she began pulling at his jacket, his imagination ran rampant.

_Pull her through the door, away from everyone. Jacket on the floor to lay her down on. Bury my nose in her hair and put my hands…_

She yanked her hand out of his pocket with a hiss of pain, and something dropped onto the floor. His wide eyes dropped from her face to the small, glowing object lying between their feet.

“It’s the TARDIS key!”

Still shaking off the remainder of the fantasy that had played out in his mind, he pulled his jacket off. With the thick leather for insulation, he picked the burning key up off the floor, and grinned broadly.

“It’s telling me that it’s still connected to the TARDIS.”

*

“When time gets sorted out…”

“Everybody here forgets what happened. And don’t worry, the thing that you changed will stay changed.”

“You mean, I’ll still be alive, though I’m meant to be dead. That’s why I haven’t done anything with my life, why it doesn’t mean anything.”

Rose was startled when her father spoke behind them, but the Doctor had known he was there. It was an underhanded thing to do, but a part of him was still jealous of Rose’s preference for her father. And, if the world was going to be changed for Pete Tyler, the Doctor wanted him to know exactly what had happened here.

“It doesn’t work like that.”

“Rubbish. I was so useless, I couldn’t even die properly. Now it’s my fault all this has happened.”

“This is my fault!”

“No, love, I’m your dad, it’s my job for it to be my fault.”

“Her dad? How are you her dad? How old were, you, twelve? Oh, that’s disgusting!”

“Jacks, listen… This is Rose.”

“Rose? How sick is that? Did you give my daughter a second-hand name? How many are there? Do you call them all Rose?”

“Oh, for God’s sake, look, it’s the same Rose!”

Too caught up in trying to ignore the domestics, The Doctor realized too late what was happening.

“Rose, no!”

Before he could grab the baby from Jackie, she was in Rose’s arms.

A Reaper appeared in the room, eyeing the source of the paradox: Rose. The Doctor’s only hope for saving her was to keep the creature’s attention long enough for the TARDIS to reappear, and take her away from here.

“I’m the oldest thing in here!”

“Doctor!”

His last thought before he was pulled into non-existence, was the hope that the TARDIS was linked strongly enough to Rose to remain after he was gone.

*

His first conscious thought was that Rose was crying.

In his first truly unselfish act since Adam had come aboard the TARDIS, the Doctor stepped beside her and laid a hand on her shoulder.

“Go to him, quick.”

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

As soon as the doors closed behind them, Rose buried her face in the Doctor’s chest, and his arms went around her immediately. Never loosening his hold on her, he guided her to the jumpseat and sat, then pulled her into his lap. While her tears soaked through his jumper, he stroked her back and murmured soothingly, rocking her gently back and forth in the seat.

When she’d finally cried herself out, she stayed curled in his lap, with her face pressed against his tear-stained jumper. It was several more minutes before she finally spoke.

“I’m sorry, Doctor, I…”

He shook his head and pulled back slightly, lifting her chin so she was looking into his eyes; her face was blotchy and puffy, her makeup had run, and her eyes were rimmed with red. She was so beautiful it made his hearts ache.

“No, Rose, this was my fault, I was wrong to make you feel bad. You’ve nothing to apologize for now, and you didn’t before either.”

He pulled a handkerchief from his jacket pocket and pressed it into her hand. Once she’d cleaned the remains of her tears from her face, he slipped it back into his pocket. With one hand, he cradled her face, letting his thumb caress her cheek gently.

“Look at me, Rose, please? I knew this sort of thing could happen, but I didn’t warn you, not really. I expected you to understand things that you couldn’t possibly, without even bothering to try to explain. I wanted… I was trying to show off again.”

“But I asked…”

“Yes, you asked, but you asked for something I knew I shouldn’t give you, that was completely irresponsible of me to give you. It was the same thing as a father letting his daughter eat too many sweets, just because she asked. I knew it was bad for you, but I did it anyway.”

Her cheeks colored, and she dropped her eyes from his again, mumbling softly.

“You’re not my father, Doctor…”

She lifted her eyes to meet his again, keeping her gaze steady.  

“…and I’m not your daughter.”

He dropped his hand from her cheek, and his hand tightened on her hip before he forced himself to relax again, and nodded slowly.

“You’re right, Rose, you’re not. But, you are in my care, and I knew better. Do you understand?”

After a few moments of silence, she nodded.

“It was only natural you wanted to save your father, Rose. It’s part of who you are to see someone hurting, and want to stop it. It’s one of the reasons I love you. It’s just… who you are…”

Suddenly realizing what he’d said, he stuttered to a stop and dropped his eyes from hers. He'd never said those words to anyone before, not with this meaning, and he was seized by the need to run, to find a place to hide, and never come out. His mind raced, trying to determine whether she’d heard, and understood what he’d said, but she remained still and silent in his lap. With no further clues to her thoughts, he could do nothing but sit, riveted in place and barely breathing until she finally spoke.

“Doctor, did you… I mean, I…”

She shifted in his lap, with her arms still looped around his neck, trying to catch his eyes again. His gaze remained locked on the far wall. All his focus was on keeping his breathing slow and even, and not tightening his arms around her waist… or dropping her, and running.

“What happened today, Doctor?”

“What do you mean, Rose?”

“I mean, what happened? You were acting weird all day. You did everything you could to keep my dad from dying again, but you acted like you hated him the whole time. It was like you were… jealous.”

There was no accusation or anger in her voice, her tone was soft and encouraging. Her cinnamon eyes never left his face, but he couldn’t make himself meet them. He knew she was waiting for an answer, but he didn’t have one to give, and the need to escape was beginning to overwhelm him. It was taking every last scrap of self-control not to push her to the floor, and run to the deepest corner of the TARDIS he could find.

The silence stretched.

After an eternity, she sighed softly and slipped off his lap.

“I’m really tired, Doctor, d’you mind if I just go to bed?”

His hands dropped into his lap, and he nodded dumbly without raising his eyes. She quietly left the room.

An hour later, he finally stood and left.

*

Back in his room, the Doctor paced between his bed and the door. For once, there was no outside consciousness niggling at him, teasing or berating him for his actions. It seemed the TARDIS recognized that he needed to be alone with his thoughts this time. He’d had no desire to hit anything, no lascivious thoughts or desires, just confusion over what had just happened.

_I told Rose that I love her._

It hadn’t been something he’d meant to do, but he had said it, and she obviously understood what he’d said. She would’ve had to be stupid not to understand, and Rose Tyler wasn’t stupid.

_Rose wasn’t upset that I said I love her._

If anything, she’d seemed disappointed that he hadn’t said something else. What  he couldn’t figure out was what she’d expected him to say. Maybe she’d expected him to apologize, or try to explain that he hadn’t meant it the way it sounded. He didn’t know that he could do either of those things.

What he did know was that he was right when he’d decided to take her home, and wrong when he’d decided to take her on one last trip. Even without the Reapers, the trip had been a disaster. They’d never fought like that before, he had never called her names, and he’d never threatened to leave her behind. The point of taking her on one last trip had been to make her happy before sending her home, but she seemed more miserable now than she had been since he’d met her.

A part of him was tempted to try to give her another ‘last trip,’ one that would actually make her happy, but he knew that was just courting further disaster. No, as soon as she woke up, he would tell her that he was taking her home, and there would be no further discussion on the matter.

That problem settled, the next came to the forefront. He was exhausted.

It hadn’t been long since he’d last slept, but the events of the past day had taken their toll. The memory of the Reaper descending on him, and the nothingness that had followed, sent a chill down his spine that was difficult to throw off. His step faltered when he shuddered, and he barely kept himself from sprawling, headfirst into the side of the bed. Glaring at his blankets did nothing to assuage his anger or fatigue, so he finally headed toward the shower, shedding his jacket and jumper as he went.

In the vain hope that it would do more good staving off exhaustion than it did arousal, he stepped into the icy spray, and shuddered. The water shocked his system enough to widen his eyes but the yawn that immediately followed proved that it was useless for any longer-term effect. Resigning himself to a forced night of sleep, he quickly washed off the grime of the day.

While he toweled himself off, he eyed the bed, and considered just climbing in naked, but thought better of it and moved to the chest of drawers. A yawn cracked his jaw as he rummaged through a drawer, and another while he pulled on his pajama bottoms.

He was asleep by the time his head hit the pillow.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

_He ran through the deserted streets of London, the screeches of Reapers ringing in his ears._

_He had to find Rose._

_Stewart and Sarah stood on the street corner as the clock stuck 2:00. They kissed, and climbed into the taxi._

_A Reaper descended, and wrapped itself around the black car. The happy couple screamed that he had lied, as they disappeared beneath its dark wings._

_The Reaper turned and saw him. Terror filled him as it raced toward him, screeching his name._

_His_ name _._

_The Powell Estate loomed large before him, and he ran toward Rose's building. Reapers descended on him as he raced forward. If he could get to Rose, she could save him from them._

_The doors of the church slammed behind him, and the Reapers screeched angrily and clawed at the wall._

_He ran from the doors, and desperately climbed the stairs to Rose's flat._

_She was so close._

_Just as his hand touched the doorknob, the wall dissolved to reveal the room inside._

_Pete and Jackie Tyler sat on the sofa, cuddled together as they watched the Reapers consume London on the telly. Rose sat on the floor in front of them, happily playing with the baby._

_The family was happy, and perfectly content while the world disintegrated around them._

_The baby raised her head, and looked at him with eyes that weren't yet Rose's._

_Jackie placed her gently in his arms._

_“Look after her for me, will you, sir? My husband needs me.”_

_Pete sat on the sofa, with Rose and Jackie on either side of him. Rose laced her fingers through her father's, and smiled up at him, adoringly._

_“My daddy, the most wonderful man in the universe.”_

_The baby in his arms dissolved into nothingness, and Gallifrey burned around him._

_Rose glowed with golden light, but it was snuffed out when black wings wrapped themselves around her._

_While Reapers consumed his hearts, fire and blood consumed his home._

_He fell to his knees and screamed in anguish as he lost everything…_

_Again._

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

“No!”

The Doctor sat upright in bed, covered in sweat.

He couldn’t stop screaming.

*

“Doctor… Doctor! Wake up!”

Rose sat on the Doctor's bed, watching helplessly while he thrashed and screamed in the only language she couldn't understand.

“Doctor… Doctor… Please…”

Her voice cracked, and tears began to trickle down her cheeks.

*

Images continued to flash through his mind. Images of death and burning, interspersed with Reapers descending on him and pulling him into nonexistence.

A gentle hand pressed to his cheek for just a moment before his thrashing shook it off, but returned immediately. It took a few more touches for his brain to recognize them for what they were, and his eyes flew open.

“Rose…”

His eyes fell onto her, and at last, the wild thrashing of his mind and body stopped. Her beautiful face was twisted in concern, and tears were streaming down her cheeks. When he finally focused on her, she smiled softly and stroked his cheek, whispering his name again.

He moved his gaze over her face, desperately for a moment, before pulling her to him, and holding her tightly. She twisted until she could wrap her arms around him, and held him close while he shook and sobbed. As his tears dampened the thin fabric of her sleep shirt, she murmured soothingly into his ear, and trailed her hands, gently along his bare back

After the Time War, in the years before he’d even cared enough to look in a mirror and see what this body looked like, he’d learned what substances could actually intoxicate a Time Lord, and where to find them. This information had been vital when he’d needed to numb the pain, and forget the dreams that left him screaming. Since Rose, however, the pain and dreams hadn’t been bad enough to warrant their use, again. If it weren’t for her arms around him now, and her soothing words in his ear, he would have already been to the room, deep in the TARDIS, where he kept a supply hidden.

Rose was better than any drug could ever hope to be.

In much less time than the tranquilizers had taken, Rose’s delicate touch calmed him until his body stopped shaking, and his sobs quieted. Slowly, his rapid breathing came to match hers, until he sat quietly in her arms, letting himself luxuriate in the feel of her gentle caress on his skin. When she finally spoke, her soft breath tickled the back of his neck.

“Doctor… are you alright?”

At her words, he realized the state she’d found him in, and pulled back, scrubbing his hands roughly over his face to hide his embarrassment. When he dropped them and looked at her, however, there was no sign of disdain for his tears. Her face held the same gentle concern it did whenever he spoke of his lost home.

“Yes, just… just a bad dream.”

She reached for his hand, but as soon as she touched his skin, she seemed to glow with the same golden light that kept appearing in his dreams, and he jerked away as if burned. Her brow creased, and she looked hurt for a moment, but quickly brushed it off, and smiled softly.

“Do you want to talk about it? Sometimes, when I was little, I’d tell Mum about my nightmares, and it’d make me feel better.”

Unable to hold her gaze, he dropped his eyes to her hand resting on the bed between them and shook his head silently. Her hand twitched toward his, but she left it where it sat, and nodded before speaking softly.

“Alright… do you want me to go then?”

“No.”

His eyes snapped back to her and he shook his head adamantly, grabbing for her hand again; her fingers laced through his automatically, in the gesture of comfort so familiar to them both. She bit her lip, and nodded slowly, keeping her cinnamon eyes locked on him, then whispered softly.

“Do you want me to stay?”

Without a moment’s hesitation, he nodded.

“Yes.”

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

  
  
  



	8. Dolent Llop

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor takes Rose on an unexpected trip.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for the long wait, but this chapter simply did not want to be written! Hopefully, it is worth the wait, and the next one shouldn't be too far behind it (though, maybe I shoudn't say that...) Anyway, I hope you enjoy it, and as always, I welcome and love your comments!

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

_ Time in dreams is frozen. _

_ You can never get away from where you’ve been. _

 

_ The Blind Assassin _ ~ Margaret Atwood

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

“Doctor… are you alright?”

At her words, he realized the state she’d found him in, and pulled back from her, scrubbing his hands roughly over his face to hide his embarrassment. When he dropped them and looked at her, however, there was no sign of disdain for his tears. Her face held the same gentle concern it always did when he spoke of his lost home.

“Yes, just… just a bad dream.”

She reached for his hand, but as soon as she touched his skin, she seemed to glow with the same golden light that kept appearing in his dreams, and he jerked away as if burned. Her brow creased, and she looked hurt for a moment, but quickly brushed it off, and gave a small smile.

“Do you want to talk about it? Sometimes, when I was little, I’d tell Mum about my nightmares, and it’d make me feel better.”

Unable to hold her gaze, he dropped his eyes to her hand resting on the bed between them and shook his head silently. Her hand twitched toward his, but she left it where it sat, and nodded before speaking softly.

“Alright… do you want me to go then?”

“No.”

His eyes snapped back to her and he shook his head adamantly, grabbing for her hand; her fingers laced through his automatically, in the gesture of comfort so familiar to them both. She bit her lip, and nodded slowly, keeping her cinnamon eyes locked on him, then whispered softly.

“Do you want me to stay?”

Without a moment’s hesitation, he nodded.

“Yes.”

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

Their eyes remained locked for a few moments longer before Rose smiled and squeezed his fingers tightly. She nodded toward him and slid off the bed.

“Budge up then, unless you want me to sleep on the floor.”

The Doctor watched her as she stood and straightened out her sleep shirt. It barely reached her mid-thigh, and the material was thin enough for him to easily see the outline of her body in the low light. The last traces of the nightmare still clung to the edges of his consciousness, but they were driven out by the sight of this beautiful girl, barely dressed and about to join him in his bed. Unbidden, his thoughts turned to what he might be able to get away with, with her in his bed with him for the next few hours.

It took a few moments for him to stop staring and remember to shift around and make room for her. As she slid under the duvet and curled up next to him, his hand automatically moved to seek hers out and their fingers wrapped around each other again, under the soft material of the duvet.

The warmth of her body seeped into his cooler skin and spread over him like a warm summer day, and he felt himself relax more fully into the bed. The desire to pull her closer overwhelmed him. He had just begun to wonder whether he could do so, and manage to convince her that was his motives were innocent when she spoke and startled him out of his thoughts.

“Doctor, can I just thank you for yesterday?”

“Thank me? For what, exactly? Watching while the Reapers devoured the world around us? Making you watch your father die, not just once, but twice? All but abandoning you in 1987 and calling you a stupid a…”

She cut him off with gentle fingers pressed to his lips.

“For my dad. All I knew of my dad before was what Mum told me, and I know now that everything she told me… well, it wasn’t exactly true. Now, I know what he was really like, I got to meet him, I got to spend hours talking to him and getting to know him. And that’s thanks to you. Everything good in my life now is thanks to you.”

Barely managing to stifle a derisive snort, the Doctor responded quickly.

“I wouldn't say that, Rose. You never see your friends or family anymore, and I even blew up your job.”

She laughed, merrily.

“I think most people would consider someone blowing up their jobs a  _ very  _ good thing, Doctor! Besides, now I’m with you, I don’t need a job anymore. The TARDIS gives me everything I need, and if we go anywhere that needs money, you can always either get some or use the psychic paper… Except when we’re getting chips in London, anyway.”

The Doctor’s sarcastic retort died out when Rose’s tongue made an appearance at the corner of her grin and he couldn’t help but grin back. His eyes dropped to her tongue and he didn’t even consider trying to control the direction his thoughts began to wander or his body’s reaction to their wandering.

They lay there quietly for some time, and he studied her face intently. It would be so easy to just pull her just a little closer, and kiss her. She was already close enough that she permeated his senses, and it was driving him spare. She hadn't worn the perfume from the Corathean Bazaar again, but with her this close, and wearing so little, her scent didn't need enhancing for it to have his brain going foggy. It was becoming more difficult to focus with each passing moment.

“Doctor, can I please have a bit more of the duvet? It's freezing in your room.”

It took a few seconds of blank staring for the Doctor’s thoughts to clear enough for him to realize what she’d said. Finally, he laughed and shifted around to free up the duvet and adjust it so Rose had enough to be fully covered.

“Sorry, Time Lord's body temperature is naturally cooler than that of a human, most of the time. There are a few times when my temperature will heat up to closer to yours, but it doesn't happen very often. Just when I'm sick or…”

He cut himself off and started coughing when he realized what he'd been about to say. He didn't really need to continue telling her that when he got randy his body temperature rose closer to hers. She was close enough that, if she was paying attention, she would likely be able to tell that he was warmer than he normally was, and he didn't really need her to know why. He was just grateful that the heavy blue duvet was covering him from the chest down because he had long since lost his battle with his blood flow and it had mostly all headed south.

He realized she was still staring and cleared his throat, looking away from her.

“I, uh… I think I need to go visit the loo. Won't be a mo.”

Before Rose could manage to respond, the Doctor had slid out from under the covers and made a break for the door to his ensuite. The door clicked shut behind him, just as she began to protest, but he pretended not to hear her.

As soon as the door shut behind him, the Doctor groaned and pressed his face against the wall. He was so hard it hurt and all he could think about was going back into the room and getting back into bed with Rose. After taking a few deep breaths, he turned back toward the mirror and looked at himself. He was naked from the waist up and very flushed. If Rose hadn’t already noticed, there was no way she would miss it if he turned around and went back out there like this.

Looking his reflection in the eye, he spoke out loud without thinking about it.

“Would it really be so bad to just do it?”

He immediately responded by snorting.

“Of course it would.”

“Doctor, did you say something?”

He cursed under his breath in Gallifreyan, before calling back to her.

“I said I… I think I need a shower really bad and of course, I should just do it…”

He rolled his eyes at the lame attempt to match what he’d said and hoped she hadn’t actually heard him. After a long moment, she called back.

“Alright… well, do you want me to wait for you? Or do you need help… with anything?”

The thought of Rose helping him out in the shower made his cock twitch painfully, and he pressed a hand against himself with a choked groan. There was a light knock on the door, right beside his head, followed by her concerned voice.

“Doctor, are you alright?”

Gritting his teeth and cursing himself mentally for not keeping better control over himself, he managed to keep his voice as light as possible.

“Yeah, yeah, ‘m fine, just… stubbed my toe. I’m gonna take a quick shower. You can just go on to sleep, I’ll just be a minute. I just don’t want you to sleep with me when I’m sweaty and stink of Reaper.”

Again, his mind wandered down new roads at his accidental choice or words, and it took Rose a few moments to respond. When she did speak, her voice was halting and unsure.

“You weren’t smelly before, I mean, I couldn’t smell you or anything. Don’t feel like you have to shower on my account, but if you want to, go ahead… I guess. I’ll just… be out here… I guess…”

“Right, won’t be half a mo!”

He called back to her in a forced, cheery voice before moving further away from the door and heading toward the shower. He stood beside the open stall and waited until he heard the bed creak, signaling that she’d returned to it, before pulling his pajama bottoms and pants off and climbing into the shower.

After considering another attempt at a cold shower, the Doctor turned the tap on and sighed heavily as the warm water began pouring over him. Even if the TARDIS had decided to allow him to have cold water, he knew that cold showers didn’t do any good and if he was going to have any chance at getting through the next few hours he was going to have to take more drastic measures. 

Trying to swallow his guilt, he took himself in hand and allowed himself to imagine what he would like to do with Rose as he began to stroke. He was so turned on that it didn’t take long for him to finish his task. Though he bit his lip hard, he hadn’t quite been able to stifle his moan of her name at the end, and he really hoped she hadn’t heard him.

Once he was done, he turned off the water and toweled himself dry before pulling his pants and pajama bottoms back on and slipped back into the bedroom. Rose was curled up on her side, facing his empty spot on the bed and looked to be asleep. For a moment, he considered just getting dressed and going to work on the TARDIS somewhere, leaving her to sleep alone in his bed. But his own exhaustion reminded him that he still needed more sleep, so he moved to slide quietly into the bed beside her.

Rose’s eyes fluttered a little as he settled himself a few feet away from her, and she gave a sleepy smile before scooting closer to him. Without a word, she slid herself under his arm, placed her head on his chest, curled up against his side and appeared to go right back to sleep.

For a moment, he lay perfectly still, unsure what to do, but when he realized her slow, steady breathing signaled that she was, in fact, fast asleep, he relaxed. Tightening his arm around her waist, he settled himself against his pillow and was soon as sound asleep as the woman cuddled up against him.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

_ Rose lay on his chest, still sleeping quietly, her breathing slow and deep. Her bare skin against his was intoxicating. He could feel her mind just at the edges of his consciousness, all he had to do was reach out and he could touch it. _

_ “Rose…” _

_ Her eyes opened and they looked at each other for a long moment before he leaned forward, closing the final inches between them, and pressed his lips to hers. She gasped softly and pulled back to study his face, smiling. _

_ “Doctor, I lo…” _

_ He cut her off with another, more forceful, kiss and this time, she responded in kind and kissed him back. Her soft lips moved against his and her hand trailed over his bare chest, sending shivers down his spine until he couldn’t bear it any longer. _

_ She squealed when he flipped her over so he was laying on top of her and smiled up at him, with her tongue peeking between her teeth. Unable to resist her pull, he leaned in and chased that teasing tongue with his lips, his own tongue sliding out to run over hers. When their tongues touched, he couldn’t keep from moaning in pleasure at the sensation. _

_ Positioning himself between her legs, he looked down at her and gasped in shock when he realized that she was glowing with golden light. She smiled up at him and it struck him that not only did she not seem to be in any pain, but she was more beautiful than ever. _

_ One leg snaked its way over his and pulled him closer while she guided him back down into another kiss with one hand. _

_ He could still feel her mind, but now, rather than feeling like he could touch it if he reached out, he felt it reaching out for him. _

_ The moment their lips touched, he felt her mind explode into his and the sensation was more pleasurable, and more shocking, than anything he’d ever experienced before. _

_ He entered her body the moment after she entered his mind, and they moved together urgently, seeking release. Somehow, he knew this release would be something completely different from anything he’d ever felt before, and he felt the same knowledge in her mind. _

_ When he opened his eyes to look at her again, he saw that the golden light had enveloped him as well and, while he knew it should, the discovery didn’t frighten him. _

_ She moaned his name and leaned up to kiss him again just as the golden light ignited around them. _

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

The Doctor opened his eyes slowly, but the dream clung to his mind like a heavy cloak. The sensation of Rose’s skin and mind refused to relinquish their hold on him, and it took much longer than it should have for him to realize that they were not part of the dream. She was still curled up with her head resting on his chest, her arm across his bare stomach, and one leg was situated between his. The leg of his pajama bottoms had ridden up so his leg was uncovered from the knee down and her bare calf was resting fully along his. With this amount of skin-to-skin contact, it would be nearly impossible for him  _ not _ to feel her mind, and he could very easily slip into it without even trying.

The idea that he could simply stay where he was, allow himself to enjoy the sensation of being surrounded so fully by her was very tempting, but he knew it was wrong. He should have sent her back to her own bed and never let her stay here in the first place, especially not the way she’d fallen asleep on him. But by now, he was well aware that, when it came to denying himself anything about Rose Tyler, he was a very, very weak man.

After allowing himself just a few moments more of the contact, he gently extricated himself from her hold. She murmured softly, in what was probably an objection, but didn’t wake.

Sitting on the side of the bed, he considered what he should do next. The feel of Rose’s skin and mind were still palpable, and he wanted nothing more than to just slide back under the covers and return to her embrace, but he knew that he wouldn’t be able to keep control of himself for much longer if he stayed. So, he decided to attempt some alterations to the TARDIS’ main program, just to keep himself occupied until she woke up.

As he quickly and quietly got dressed, he realized that he felt better and more rested than he had since before the war. He allowed himself to consider that it might be Rose’s presence that accounted for the difference just until he finished pulling his jacket on, then banished the thought from his mind.

*

When Rose finally appeared, the Doctor was just sliding out from under the console.

“Good morning, Rose. You’re just in time, we’re just about to arrive.”

As he straightened up, he blinked in surprise when he found that she was still wearing nothing but her sleep shirt. It was very unusual for her to come into the console room without getting dressed first, but he did his best to pay as little attention to this fact as possible. Though that was much easier said than done. She watched him curiously, as he began programming the controls to access the new hardware he’d installed.

“Arrive? Where are we going?”

Carefully keeping his eyes on the controls and not her almost complete lack of clothing, he grinned but didn’t answer her question.

“You can’t go dressed like that. Head back to the wardrobe and the TARDIS will help you pick out something more appropriate.”

Giving him one more exasperated look, she shrugged and headed back down the hall.

When she returned a few minutes later, she had on a pink snowsuit, with grey accents at the shoulders, wrists, ankles and hip pockets with white fur lining the hood and peeking out at the wrists and ankles. She also wore grey boots with pink soles and more white fur lining showing at the top, and grey gloves, trimmed with still more white fur.

“Alright, Doctor, are you going to tell me where we’re going now? And you’d better not say the beach!”

Struggling to keep from grinning, the Doctor opened the doors and ushered Rose out onto a beach in the middle of a massive storm.

At first, she gasped and jumped back from a wave that was about to crash into the TARDIS but stopped and stared when she realized that it was frozen in place. In front of them, the ocean stretched as far as the eye could see, and the surface was torn apart with huge waves that curled over on the point of breaking but would never do so.

Rose stared at the scene, wide-eyed, for some time before finally moving away from the TARDIS. With her arms wrapped tightly around herself, she walked along the edge of the water, studying the frozen waves carefully. From time to time, she stopped to study a particularly interesting ice formation, but for the most part, she continued walking for the better part of an hour.

The Doctor remained by the TARDIS, watching her until she finally came back to stand before him.

“It’s beautiful, Doctor. Is it meant to be frozen like this, or did something happen?”

“Something happened.”

“What?”

He frowned at her for a moment before finally answering.

“There was a war.”

“A war? How did a war cause this? This looks like an ice age, but I thought those were supposed to be naturally occurring, or because of global warming or something.”

“The war was between two extremely intelligent groups of people, and it’s a fairly well-known phenomenon that the more intelligent the people fighting, the more disastrous the results of the fight.”

“But, why would someone develop a weapon that would freeze an entire planet?”

Pushing off from the TARDIS, the Doctor moved over to the wave that curled directly in front of it that had startled Rose when they arrived. Reaching up to idly stroke the huge icicle hanging there, he continued, conversationally,

“Ah, but it wasn’t meant to freeze the entire planet, was it? It was only meant to freeze the capital city of the enemy, but one of those highly intelligent people made a mistake. From what I’ve been able to gather, it was a very simple mistake too, there was a decimal that got put a couple spaces out of place. So, what was meant to cripple the head of the enemy, destroyed all life on the planet and kept anything else from growing for a few hundred thousand years. Really, it did exactly what it was supposed to do, it ended the war without damaging the infrastructure of the cities. If we go to the city that was actually bombed, it is in perfect condition, just the same as the day it was bombed, it’s just frozen solid. Hardly any the worse for the wear of the past few hundred thousand years.”

Rose moved to stand beside him and lowered the hood of her snowsuit so he could see her face again, even though she didn’t look at him. The Doctor watched her out of the corner of his eye while she studied the icicle with the same fascination he had been showing it a moment before.

“So… the bomb was meant to freeze everything so it would just kill the people, but leave all the buildings and everything so they could still be used?”

“Exactly.”

“That’s horrible!”

The Doctor frowned at the icicle again for a moment, before turning to look directly at Rose again.

“Yes, it is, but war is always horrible. This one wasn’t any much more or less horrible than any other before or since.”

She turned to face him and took a deep breath before speaking, again.

“Where are we, Doctor?”

“Well, I supposed that depends on who you ask. If you ask someone from now, they'll tell you it's called one thing, but if you ask someone who was around before, they'll tell you something different.”

“What would someone from before call it?”

“Dolent Llop.”

“And now?”

“Woman Wept.”

She considered this for a long while, studying his face intently the entire time as if looking for something.

“Why is it called Woman Wept?”

“There are a couple different stories about that. The most popular, says it's because the main continent, when you look at it from above, looks like a woman, curled in on herself and lamenting. The other is a bit more… fanciful.”

“What is it?”

Rose’s continued scrutiny was making him slightly uncomfortable, so the Doctor turned and walked along the edge of the water as he spoke, forcing her to follow if she wanted to hear.

“That the woman who created the weapon was the last to be frozen, and in the moment before she froze, she realized what she’d done, and wept.”

“And which story do you believe, Doctor?”

“I believe both are plausible.”

“That's not what I asked.”

Suddenly, he stopped and turned to her. Her questions were beginning to annoy him, though he couldn’t place why, and his blue eyes were as icy as the frozen ocean surrounding them as he studied her face.

“I believe that, if a person developed something that would destroy an entire city, even if it was the only way to end a war if that person was sane, crying wouldn't be out of the ordinary. And, if that person found out that they had really killed everyone on the planet, rather than just the city they'd intended, enough tears to warrant the renaming of a planet wouldn't be unfathomable either.”

By the time he finished speaking, his voice had started to rise and he was breathing heavily. He kept his eyes locked on hers in a cold glare for another beat before shrugging and looking away from his concerned friend.

“But the continent does look like a woman if you look at it right. I’ll show you if you like, then you can decide for yourself.”

Ignoring her objection, he headed back into the TARDIS, leaving her no choice but to follow.

As soon as Rose was back inside, the Doctor closed the doors and began programming the controls. While the sequence played out, he took the time to take a few deep breaths and try to relax. He wasn’t sure why her questions had upset him, but he needed to calm down and behave like a rational person before he did something more than raise his voice.

Once the TARDIS had rematerialized, he went to the doors and opened them and Rose followed him, gasping when she saw that they were now suspended in air, thousands of feet over the main continent of Dolent Llop/Woman Wept.

She stared from a half dozen feet back, her eyes flickering from the stunning view out the open doors, to the Doctor standing beside them. Taking her gently by the hand, he guided her over to stand at the open door with him, speaking in a soothing voice.

“Don’t worry, I won’t let you fall.”

He slid his arm around her waist and held her close. Unable to keep the smile from his face when Rose snuggled tightly against his side, the Doctor moved a half step forward, until they were right at the edge of the ramp and practically hanging out the door.

Reminding himself that she was only pressing herself so tightly against him to keep from falling, he tightened his arms around her waist and anchored her to his side. He pointed down toward the continent, which did, indeed, look like a woman crying.

“See? It’s easy to see why people would call this place Woman Wept from looking at it from up here.”

Rose nodded, looking down at the breathtaking view in awe.

“Yes.”

Sighing softly, she slid her arms under his jacket and wrapped them around his waist and rested her head on his chest, snuggling close against him. They stood that way, wrapped in each other’s arms in the cold air overlooking the frozen planet for a long time before Rose spoke again.

“Doctor, is… have you ever been here before?”

Tilting his head down to look at the top of the head of the girl snuggled in his arms, the Doctor frowned down at Rose for a few moments, wondering what she was getting at.

“Yes, before the war, but this is the first time since. Why do you ask?”

She straightened up and pulled back enough to face him, but stayed securely in his arms.

“Is this your planet, Doctor?”

Startled, the Doctor dropped his arms and took a step back.

“My planet? Why would you think this was my planet?”

“Because, it was destroyed by a war, and the person who destroyed it lived and was sad about it…”

Realization hit the Doctor at her words and he shook his head sadly.

“No, Rose, this isn’t my planet, what happened on my planet was much worse than any other war. There isn’t anything left of my planet at all, I told you before that it was just dust and rocks… not even that, really.”

Furrowing her brow deeply, Rose chewed on her lip for a few moments before looking at him again.

“Why did we come here, then, if it’s not your planet?”

Laughing softly, the Doctor turned and walked over to the console and pointed to the new piece of hardware he’d attached while Rose had been sleeping.

“Because of that.”

Rose followed and looked blankly at the section of panel the Doctor was pointing at. It took him a minute to realize that she probably had no idea which piece of equipment he was pointing at and even less idea what it did.

“It’s something I developed a long time ago when I needed to be able to hide where I was going from the Black Guardian. It generates a random seed code to calculate algorithmic impossibilities in the TARDIS’ mainframe computer...”

Rose’s mouth was slack and her eyes had already glazed over, so the Doctor laughed again and shook his head.

“Look, it’s called the randomizer, and it does exactly what it says on the tin. I set the controls, and the TARDIS takes us someplace random. This time, it took us to Dolent Llop. Fortunately, she likes you enough that she provided you with the proper wardrobe for the trip, be glad she didn’t dress you for that beach a few hundred thousand years ago.”

Before he could keep it from his mind, the image of Rose in the blue bikini she’d worn at the pool before Satellite 5 appeared before his eyes, and the Doctor couldn’t keep a grin from covering his face. Fortunately, Rose didn’t know the full reasoning behind his grin, and just grinned back.

“Yeah, she does treat me good, don’t she?”

Stepping forward, she reached out and stroked the edge of the console, lovingly, and the Doctor’s grin broadened. It made him incredibly happy that his TARDIS seemed to be almost as fond of his Rose as he was, even if he didn’t understand exactly why.

He moved forward and reached out to stroke the console as well, but just before his hand touched the coral, an alarm sounded and lights all over the console began to flash mauve.

“What did you…”

His first thought was that Rose had touched something, but her hand was nowhere near any controls, so he looked down to where he’d attached the randomizer. Rose stepped back and watched, wide-eyed while he crouched down and began inspecting the console for any signs of a problem, but there was nothing.

“It’s not the console…”

Jumping back to his feet, the Doctor raced around the console to a screen that was flashing out a warning. He studied it for a moment before muttering under his breath.

“It’s declaring an emergency…”

*

As soon as the Doctor realized the source of the distress call, he sprang into action and started dancing around the console as he set about locking onto the ship.

“What’s the emergency?”

A bell rang as the TARDIS accepted the command, and Rose danced around the console, following the Doctor and trying, desperately, to figure out what was going on.

“It’s mauve!”

“Mauve?”

“Universally recognized color for danger.”

“What happened to red?”

Concentrating on the console, the Doctor explained to Rose while he watched the TARDIS read back the information being fed to it remotely.

“That’s just humans. By everyone else’s standards, red’s camp. Oh, the misunderstandings. All those red alerts, all that dancing! It’s got a very basic flight computer. I’ve hacked in, slaved the TARDIS. Wherever it goes, we go.”

“And that’s safe, is it?”

“Totally.”

Sparks immediately exploded from the console and they both jumped back, Rose shrieking in surprise. The Doctor leapt forward, adjusting the controls to make up for the changing information being fed to the TARDIS from the ship they were following.

“Okay, reasonably. I should have said ‘reasonably’ there!”

An alarm rang out from the monitor and the Doctor shouted in frustration.

“No. No, no! It’s jumping time tracks, getting away from us!”

“What exactly is this thing?”

“No idea.”

“Then why are we chasing it?!”

“It’s mauve and dangerous… and about 30 seconds from the center of London.”

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*


End file.
